August Ferdinand Möbius

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August Möbius
Otto Wilhelm Fiedler
Other notable studentsHermann Hankel

August Ferdinand Möbius (UK: /ˈmɜːbiəs/, US: /ˈmeɪ-, ˈmoʊ-/;[1] German: [ˈmøːbi̯ʊs]; 17 November 1790 – 26 September 1868) was a German mathematician and theoretical astronomer.

Early life and education

Möbius was born in

University of Halle, where he completed his doctoral thesis The occultation of fixed stars in 1815.[3] In 1816, he was appointed as Extraordinary Professor to the "chair of astronomy and higher mechanics" at the University of Leipzig.[3] Möbius died in Leipzig in 1868 at the age of 77. His son Theodor was a noted philologist
.

Contributions

He is best known for his discovery of the

4-polytopes, Möbius (with Cayley and Grassmann) was one of only three other people who had also conceived of the possibility of geometry in more than three dimensions.[5]

Many mathematical concepts are named after him, including the

Möbius transform of number theory. His interest in number theory led to the important Möbius function μ(n) and the Möbius inversion formula. In Euclidean geometry, he systematically developed the use of signed angles and line segments as a way of simplifying and unifying results.[6]

Collected works
  • 1843 copy of Die Elemente der Mechanik des Himmels
    1843 copy of Die Elemente der Mechanik des Himmels
  • Title page to a 1843 copy of Die Elemente der Mechanik des Himmels
    Title page to a 1843 copy of Die Elemente der Mechanik des Himmels
  • First page to a 1843 copy of Die Elemente der Mechanik des Himmels
    First page to a 1843 copy of Die Elemente der Mechanik des Himmels

See also

References

  1. ISBN 978-1-4058-8118-0
    .
  2. ISBN 978-0-525-95024-0
    .
  3. ^ a b c d August Ferdinand Möbius. University of St Andrews, Scotland. Archived from the original on 30 March 2016.
  4. ISBN 0-8284-0269-8
    , page 33, footnote 1
  5. ^ Coxeter, H.S.M. (1973) [1948]. Regular Polytopes (3rd ed.). New York: Dover. p. 141.
  6. ^ Howard Eves, A Survey of Geometry (1963), p. 64 (Revised edition 1972, Allyn & Bacon,
    ISBN 0-205-03226-5
    )

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to August Ferdinand Möbius.
Wikisource has the text of a 1920 Encyclopedia Americana article about August Ferdinand Möbius.
Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article "Möbius, August Ferdinand".
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