Désiré André (André Antoine Désiré) (March 29, 1840, Lyon – September 12, 1917, Paris) was a French mathematician, best known for his work on

Catalan number In combinatorial mathematics, the Catalan numbers are a sequence of natural numbers that occur in various counting problems, often involving recursively defined objects. They are named after the French-Belgian mathematician Eugène Charles C ...

s and

alternating permutation In combinatorial mathematics, an alternating permutation (or zigzag permutation) of the set is a permutation (arrangement) of those numbers so that each entry is alternately greater or less than the preceding entry. For example, the five alt ...

Biography

He is the son of Auguste Antoine Désiré André, shoemaker in Lyon, and his wife Antoinette Magdalene Jar. He entered the

École Normale Supérieure École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education Secondary education or post-primary education covers two phases on the International Standard Classification of Education sca ...

in 1860 and passed the

Agrégation In France, the ''agrégation'' () is a competitive examination for civil service in the French public education system. Candidates for the examination, or ''agrégatifs'', become ''agrégés'' once they are admitted to the position of ''profess ...

in Mathematics in 1863. He defended his doctoral thesis on 25 March 1877. He was a student of

Charles Hermite Charles Hermite () FRS FRSE MIAS (24 December 1822 – 14 January 1901) was a French mathematician who did research concerning number theory, quadratic forms, invariant theory, orthogonal polynomials, elliptic functions, and algebra. Herm ...

(1822–1901) and

Joseph Bertrand Joseph Louis François Bertrand (; 11 March 1822 – 5 April 1900) was a French mathematician who worked in the fields of number theory, differential geometry, probability theory, economics and thermodynamics. Biography Joseph Bertrand was ...

(1822–1900). Starting as a teacher at the Lycée de Troyes, he went on to

Collège Sainte-Barbe The Collège Sainte-Barbe is a former college in the 5th arrondissement of Paris, France. The Collège Sainte-Barbe was founded in 1460 on Montagne Sainte-Geneviève ( Latin Quarter, Paris) by Pierre Antoine Victor de Lanneau, teacher of religio ...

, then to the

University of Dijon A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, the ...

and finally became professor of mathematics at

Collège Stanislas de Paris The Collège Stanislas de Paris (), colloquially known as Stan, is a highly selective private Catholic school in Paris, situated on "Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs" in the 6th arrondissement. It has more than 3,000 students, from preschool to ''classe ...

from 1885 to 1900. He was a laureate of the Ministère de l'Instruction Publique, member of the

Circolo Matematico di Palermo The Circolo Matematico di Palermo (Mathematical Circle of Palermo) is an Italian mathematical society, founded in Palermo by Sicilian geometer Giovanni B. Guccia in 1884.

and the Commission Internationale Permanente de Bibliographie Mathématique. He was made a Knight of the

Legion of Honour The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...

in July 1897. Désiré André played a role in the French mathematical community of his time, including the

Société Mathématique de France Lactalis is a French multinational dairy products corporation, owned by the Besnier family and based in Laval, Mayenne, France. The company's former name was Besnier SA. Lactalis is the largest dairy products group in the world, and is the sec ...

. He was the treasurer of the association from its inception in 1873 to 1876. He became chairman of the Société in 1889 or 1890. He was the author of a 1909 book on notation in elementary mathematics, ''Des notations mathématiques, énumération, choix et usage''. He was president of the Société philomathique de Paris. He lived at 28 rue Vauquelin, Paris.

Key publications

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bibliographic entry at UPMC's scientific digital library
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Bibliography

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References

External links

Author profile
in

zbMATH zbMATH Open, formerly Zentralblatt MATH, is a major reviewing service providing reviews and abstracts for articles in pure and applied mathematics, produced by the Berlin office of FIZ Karlsruhe – Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructur ...

.
Brief biography (p. 41)

Another short biography (p. 22)
1840 births 1917 deaths 19th-century French mathematicians 20th-century French mathematicians École Normale Supérieure alumni {{France-mathematician-stub