Fefferman, Charles Louis(1949– ) American mathematician who
began college at the age of 12, graduated at 17, received his
doctorate at 20, and at 22 became a professor at the University
of Chicago, making him the youngest professor in American
history. Currently a professor at Princeton University, he is
famous for his Fields Medal award-winning work on partial
differential EQUATIONs.
Fermat, Pierre de(1601–65) French lawyer and government official
who studied mathematics as a pastime and became one of the
most highly regarded mathematicians of his time, although a
bit controversial. Fermat never published his work, but instead
wrote letters to prominent mathematicians challenging them
with problems that he had already secretly solved. This often
resulted in accusations of purposely taunting them with
“impossible” problems. He and RENÉ DESCARTESwere at odds
for many years because of Fermat’s low opinion of Descartes’s
work, which he once described as “groping about in the
shadows,” and because Descartes was on a personal mission to
ruin Fermat’s reputation as a mathematician. Fermat is most
known for his work in number theory, in which he states that
xn+yn=znhas no nonzero INTEGER SOLUTIONs for x, y, and
zwhen n> 2, for which he gave no PROOF. This is known as
Fermat’s Last Theorem, and at the time was not considered
important enough by mathematicians to try to find a proof. The
THEOREMremained unsolved for more than 300 years, and was
finally proved by British mathematician ANDREW JOHN WILES
in 1994.
Ferrari, Lodovico (Ludovico Ferraro)(1522–65) This Italian
mathematician began his mathematical studies as a 14-year-old
servant to GIROLAMO CARDAN, who decided the boy was so
bright that he had to teach him. Ferrari discovered the
SOLUTIONto the QUARTIC EQUATION, but because he was
working with Cardan and the solution involved the CUBIC
equation, he ended up in a very public and lengthy series of
insults with NICHOLAS TARTAGLIA. The two ultimately had a
public debate, which Ferrari clearly was winning, so Tartaglia
left town.
Ferro, Scipione del (Ferreo, dal Ferro)(1465–1526) Italian
mathematician best known for being the first to solve CUBIC
Fefferman – Ferro BIOGRAPHIES
Fefferman – Ferro BIOGRAPHIES
Pierre de Fermat (University
of Rochester, Courtesy of AIP
Emilio Segrè Visual Archives)