Thomas Joannes Stieltjes

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Thomas Joannes Stieltjes
École Normale Supérieure
Known forRiemann–Stieltjes integral

Lebesgue–Stieltjes integration

Stieltjes constants

Stieltjes matrix

Stieltjes transformation

Stieltjes polynomials

Laplace–Stieltjes transform

Stieltjes–Wigert polynomials

Chebyshev–Markov–Stieltjes inequalities

Heine–Stieltjes polynomials

Stieltjes moment problem

Fourier-Stieltjes algebra

Henstock-Kurzweil-Stieltjes integral

Mertens conjecture

University of Leiden
Doctoral advisorCharles Hermite
Jean Gaston Darboux

Thomas Joannes Stieltjes (Dutch: [ˈstilcəs], 29 December 1856 – 31 December 1894) was a Dutch mathematician. He was a pioneer in the field of moment problems and contributed to the study of continued fractions. The Thomas Stieltjes Institute for Mathematics at Leiden University, dissolved in 2011, was named after him, as is the Riemann–Stieltjes integral.

Biography

Stieltjes was born in

Jacobi — the consequence of this being he failed his examinations. There were 2 further failures (in 1875 and 1876), and his father despaired. His father was friends with H. G. van de Sande Bakhuyzen (who was the director of Leiden University), and Stieltjes Jr. was able to get a job as an assistant at Leiden Observatory
.

Soon afterwards, Stieltjes began a correspondence with Charles Hermite which lasted for the rest of his life. He originally wrote to Hermite concerning celestial mechanics, but the subject quickly turned to mathematics and he began to devote his spare time to mathematical research.

The director of

analytical geometry and on descriptive geometry
. He resigned his post at the observatory at the end of that year.

In 1884, Stieltjes applied for a chair in

Groningen. He was initially accepted, but in the end turned down by the Department of Education, since he lacked the required diplomas. In 1884, Hermite and professor David Bierens de Haan arranged for an honorary doctorate to be granted to Stieltjes by Leiden University, enabling him to become a professor. In 1885, he was appointed as member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences (Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, KNAW), the next year he became foreign member.[1] In 1889, he was appointed professor of differential and integral calculus at Toulouse University
.

Research

Stieltjes worked on almost all branches of

continued fractions and number theory
, and for his work, he is sometimes called "the father of the analytic theory of continued fractions".

His work is also seen as important as a first step towards the theory of

elliptic functions. He became known internationally because of the Riemann–Stieltjes integral
.

Awards

Stieltjes' work on continued fractions earned him the

Académie des Sciences
.

See also

References

  1. ^ "Thomas Jan Stieltjes Jr. (1856–1894)". Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 30 July 2015.

External links

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