László Fuchs (born June 24, 1924) is a Hungarian-born American mathematician, the Evelyn and John G. Phillips Distinguished Professor Emeritus in Mathematics at

Tulane University The Tulane University of Louisiana (commonly referred to as Tulane University) is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by a cohort of medical doctors, it b ...

.Faculty profile
, Tulane Univ., retrieved 2012-02-19. He is known for his research and textbooks in

group theory In abstract algebra, group theory studies the algebraic structures known as group (mathematics), groups. The concept of a group is central to abstract algebra: other well-known algebraic structures, such as ring (mathematics), rings, field ( ...

and

abstract algebra In mathematics, more specifically algebra, abstract algebra or modern algebra is the study of algebraic structures, which are set (mathematics), sets with specific operation (mathematics), operations acting on their elements. Algebraic structur ...

...

Biography

Fuchs was born on June 24, 1924, in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

, into an academic family: his father was a linguist and a member of the

Hungarian Academy of Sciences The Hungarian Academy of Sciences ( , MTA) is Hungary’s foremost and most prestigious learned society. Its headquarters are located along the banks of the Danube in Budapest, between Széchenyi rakpart and Akadémia utca. The Academy's primar ...

. He earned a bachelor's degree in 1946 and a doctorate in 1947 from

Eötvös Loránd University Eötvös Loránd University (, ELTE, also known as ''University of Budapest'') is a Hungarian public research university based in Budapest. Founded in 1635, ELTE is one of the largest and most prestigious public higher education institutions in ...

. After teaching high school mathematics for two years, and then holding positions at Eötvös Loránd, the Mathematical Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and the

University of Miami The University of Miami (UM, UMiami, Miami, U of M, and The U) is a private university, private research university in Coral Gables, Florida, United States. , the university enrolled 19,852 students in two colleges and ten schools across over ...

, he joined the Tulane faculty in 1968. At Tulane, Fuchs chaired the mathematics department from 1977 to 1979. He retired in 2004. In 2004, Fuchs was honored at the

80th anniversary as one of the "big five" most distinguished Hungarian mathematicians. The other honorees included John Horvath, János Aczél,

Ákos Császár Ákos Császár (, ) (26 February 1924 – 14 December 2017) was a Hungarian mathematician, specializing in general topology and real analysis. He discovered the Császár polyhedron, a nonconvex polyhedron without diagonals. He introduced the ...

and

Steven Gaal Steven Alexander Gaal (February 22, 1924 – March 17, 2016) (also known as István Sándor Gál or I. S. Gál) was a Hungarian- American mathematician and Professor of Mathematics at the University of Minnesota—Minneapolis. Education Ga ...

.Tribute to the achievements of five outstanding Hungarian mathematicians
Department of Mathematical Sciences of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Fuchs has nearly 100 academic descendants, many of them through his student at Eötvös Loránd,

George Grätzer George A. Grätzer (; born 2 August 1936, in Budapest) is a Hungarian-Canadian mathematician, specializing in lattice theory and universal algebra. He is known for his books on LaTeX and his proof with E. Tamás Schmidt of the Grätzer–Schmidt th ...

. He was treasurer of the

János Bolyai Mathematical Society The János Bolyai Mathematical Society (Bolyai János Matematikai Társulat, BJMT) is the Hungarian mathematical society, named after János Bolyai, a 19th-century Hungarian mathematician, a co-discoverer of non-Euclidean geometry. It is the profe ...

from 1949 until 1963, and secretary-general of the society from 1963 to 1966. Fuchs

turned 100 A centenarian is a person who has reached the age of 100. Because life expectancies at birth worldwide are well below 100, the term is invariably associated with longevity. The United Nations estimated that there were 316,600 living centenarian ...

on June 24, 2024.

Books

*. Reprinted by Pergamon Press, International Series of Monographs on Pure and Applied Mathematics, 1960. *. Translated into Russian and German. *. *. *. *. *. *.

Awards and honors

Fuchs won the

Kossuth Prize The Kossuth Prize (, ) is a state-sponsored award in Hungary, named after the Hungarian politician and revolutionist Lajos Kossuth. The Prize was established in 1936, by the Hungarian National Assembly, to acknowledge outstanding personal and grou ...

in 1953. He is a foreign member of the

.. Two conferences were dedicated to him on the occasion of his 70th birthday, and another on his 75th. At Tulane University, Fuchs held the W. R. Irby Professorship from 1979 to 1992, and the Evelyn and John G. Phillips Distinguished Professorship from then until his retirement. In 2012 he became a fellow of the

American Mathematical Society The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meetings, ...

.List of Fellows of the American Mathematical Society
retrieved 2012-12-29.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fuchs, Laszlo 1924 births Living people 20th-century American mathematicians 20th-century Hungarian mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians 21st-century Hungarian mathematicians Eötvös Loránd University alumni Academic staff of Eötvös Loránd University University of Miami faculty Tulane University faculty Fellows of the American Mathematical Society Algebraists American men centenarians Group theorists Hungarian men centenarians Hungarian emigrants to the United States