I. Martin "Marty" Isaacs is a group theorist and representation theorist and professor emeritus of

mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

at the

University of Wisconsin–Madison The University of Wisconsin–Madison (University of Wisconsin, Wisconsin, UW, UW–Madison, or simply Madison) is a public land-grant research university in Madison, Wisconsin. Founded when Wisconsin achieved statehood in 1848, UW–Madison ...

. He currently lives in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and Emer ...

and is an occasional participant on

MathOverflow MathOverflow is a mathematics question-and-answer (Q&A) website, which serves as an online community of mathematicians. It allows users to ask questions, submit answers, and rate both, all while getting merit points for their activities. It is a ...

Academic biography

Isaacs completed his Ph.D. from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

in 1964 under

Richard Brauer Richard Dagobert Brauer (February 10, 1901 – April 17, 1977) was a leading German and American mathematician. He worked mainly in abstract algebra, but made important contributions to number theory. He was the founder of modular represent ...

. From at least 1969 until 2011, he was a professor at the

. In May 2011, he retired and became a professor emeritus. The

Mathematics Genealogy Project The Mathematics Genealogy Project (MGP) is a web-based database for the academic genealogy of mathematicians.. By 31 December 2021, it contained information on 274,575 mathematical scientists who contributed to research-level mathematics. For a ty ...

lists him as having had 28 doctoral students.

Research

Isaacs is most famous for formulating the Isaacs–Navarro conjecture along with Gabriel Navarro, a widely cited generalization of the

McKay conjecture In mathematics, specifically in the field of group theory, the McKay conjecture is a conjecture of equality between the number of irreducible complex character theory, characters of degree not divisible by a prime number p to that of the centralize ...

Books

Isaacs is famous as the author of ''Character Theory of Finite Groups'' (first published in 1976), one of the most well-known graduate student-level introductory books in

character theory In mathematics, more specifically in group theory, the character of a group representation is a function on the group that associates to each group element the trace of the corresponding matrix. The character carries the essential information about ...

and representation theory of finite groups. Isaacs is also the author of the book ''Algebra: A Graduate Course'' (first published in 1994; republished in 2009), which received highly positive reviews. Additionally, he is the author of ''Finite Group Theory'' (published in 2008).

Honors

Isaacs is a professor emeritus at the

. He retired in 2011. In 2009, a conference was held at the Universitat de Valencia in

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

to honor his contributions. Isaacs is also 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, ...

. Isaacs was a Pólya lecturer for the

Mathematical Association of America The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) is a professional society that focuses on mathematics accessible at the undergraduate level. Members include university, college, and high school teachers; graduate and undergraduate students; pure a ...

. He received the Benjamin Smith Reynolds award for teaching engineering students at the University of Wisconsin and a UW Madison campus teaching award. He was also the recipient of a

Sloan Foundation The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation is an American philanthropic nonprofit organization. It was established in 1934 by Alfred P. Sloan Jr., then-president and chief executive officer of General Motors. The Sloan Foundation makes grants to support o ...

research award.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Isaacs, Martin 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Living people Group theorists Harvard University alumni University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty Writers from Wisconsin Fellows of the American Mathematical Society Year of birth missing (living people)