Kurt Mahler was a mathematician and Fellow of the Royal Society.

He was a student at the universities in Frankfurt

Frankfurt

Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...

 and Göttingen

Göttingen

Göttingen is a university town in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Göttingen. The Leine river runs through the town. In 2006 the population was 129,686.-General information:...

, graduating with a Ph.D.

Ph.D.

A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...

 from Johann Wolfgang Goethe University of Frankfurt am Main

Johann Wolfgang Goethe University of Frankfurt am Main

The Goethe University Frankfurt was founded in 1914 as a Citizens' University, which means that, while it was a State university of Prussia, it had been founded and financed by the wealthy and active liberal citizenry of Frankfurt am Main, a unique feature in German university history...

 in 1927.
He left Germany with the rise of Hitler and accepted an invitation by Louis Mordell

Louis Mordell

Louis Joel Mordell was a British mathematician, known for pioneering research in number theory. He was born in Philadelphia, USA, in a Jewish family of Lithuanian extraction...

 to go to Manchester

Manchester

Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

. He became a British citizen in 1946.

Mahler held the following positions:

• University of Manchester
  University of Manchester
  The University of Manchester is a public research university located in Manchester, United Kingdom. It is a "red brick" university and a member of the Russell Group of research-intensive British universities and the N8 Group...
  
  
  • Assistant Lecturer at 1937–39, 1941–44
  • Lecturer, 1944–47; Senior Lecturer, 1948–49; Reader, 1949–52
  • Professor of Mathematical Analysis, 1952–63
• Professor of Mathematics, Institute of Advanced Studies, Australian National University
  Australian National University
  The Australian National University is a teaching and research university located in the Australian capital, Canberra.As of 2009, the ANU employs 3,945 administrative staff who teach approximately 10,000 undergraduates, and 7,500 postgraduate students...
  
  , 1963–68 and 1972–5
• Professor of Mathematics, Ohio State University
  Ohio State University
  The Ohio State University, commonly referred to as Ohio State, is a public research university located in Columbus, Ohio. It was originally founded in 1870 as a land-grant university and is currently the third largest university campus in the United States...
  
  , USA, 1968–72
• Professor Emeritus, Australian National University
  Australian National University
  The Australian National University is a teaching and research university located in the Australian capital, Canberra.As of 2009, the ANU employs 3,945 administrative staff who teach approximately 10,000 undergraduates, and 7,500 postgraduate students...
  
  , from 1975.

He was elected a member of the Royal Society

Royal Society

The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...

 in 1948 and a member of the Australian Academy of Science

Australian Academy of Science

The Australian Academy of Science was founded in 1954 by a group of distinguished Australians, including Australian Fellows of the Royal Society of London. The first president was Sir Mark Oliphant. The Academy is modelled after the Royal Society and operates under a Royal Charter; as such it is...

 in 1965.
He was awarded the London Mathematical Society

London Mathematical Society

-See also:* American Mathematical Society* Edinburgh Mathematical Society* European Mathematical Society* List of Mathematical Societies* Council for the Mathematical Sciences* BCS-FACS Specialist Group-External links:* * *...

's Senior Berwick Prize in 1950, the De Morgan

Augustus De Morgan

Augustus De Morgan was a British mathematician and logician. He formulated De Morgan's laws and introduced the term mathematical induction, making its idea rigorous. The crater De Morgan on the Moon is named after him....

 Medal, 1971, and the Thomas Ranken Lyle Medal

Thomas Ranken Lyle Medal

The Thomas Ranken Lyle Medal is awarded at most every two years by the Australian Academy of Science to a mathematician or physicist for his or her outstanding research accomplishments. It is named after Thomas Ranken Lyle, an Irish mathematical physicist who became a professor at the University of...

, 1977.

He spoke fluent Chinese

Chinese language

The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...

 and was an expert photographer.

Mahler proved that the Prouhet–Thue–Morse constant and the Champernowne constant

Champernowne constant

In mathematics, the Champernowne constant C10 is a transcendental real constant whose decimal expansion has important properties. It is named after mathematician D. G...

 0.1234567891011121314151617181920... are transcendental number

Transcendental number

In mathematics, a transcendental number is a number that is not algebraic—that is, it is not a root of a non-constant polynomial equation with rational coefficients. The most prominent examples of transcendental numbers are π and e...

s.

See also

• Mahler's inequality
  Mahler's inequality
  In mathematics, Mahler's inequality states that the geometric mean of the term-by-term sum of two finite sequences of positive numbers is greater than or equal to the sum of their two separate geometric means:...
  
  
• Mahler measure
• Mahler polynomial
  Mahler polynomial
  In mathematics, the Mahler polynomials gn are polynomials introduced by in his work on the zeros of the incomplete gamma function.Mahler polynomials are given by the generating function\displaystyle \sum g_nt^n/n! = \exp...
  
  
• Mahler volume
  Mahler volume
  In convex geometry, the Mahler volume of a centrally symmetric convex body is a dimensionless quantity that is associated with the body and is invariant under linear transformations. It is named after German-English mathematician Kurt Mahler...
  
  
• Mahler's theorem
  Mahler's theorem
  In mathematics, Mahler's theorem, introduced by , expresses continuous p-adic functions in terms of polynomials.In any field, one has the following result. Let=f-f\,be the forward difference operator...
  
  
• Mahler's compactness theorem
  Mahler's compactness theorem
  In mathematics, Mahler's compactness theorem, proved by , is a foundational result on lattices in Euclidean space, characterising sets of lattices that are 'bounded' in a certain definite sense. Looked at another way, it explains the ways in which a lattice could degenerate in a sequence of...
  
  
• Skolem–Mahler–Lech theorem
  Skolem–Mahler–Lech theorem
  In additive number theory, the Skolem–Mahler–Lech theorem, named after Thoralf Skolem, Kurt Mahler, and Christer Lech, states that the indices of the null elements of a linear recurrence sequence are the union of a finite set and finitely many arithmetic progressions. The proofs of this result use...