Lothar Collatz
Encyclopedia
Lothar Collatz was a German
mathematician
. In 1937 he posed the famous Collatz conjecture
, which remains unsolved.
The Collatz-Wielandt formula for positive matrices important in the Perron–Frobenius theorem
is named after him.
Collatz studied at different universities in Germany including the University of Berlin under Alfred Klose, receiving his doctorate in 1935 for a dissertation entitled Das Differenzenverfahren mit höherer Approximation für lineare Differentialgleichungen (The finite difference method with higher approximation for linear differential equations).
For his many contributions to the field, Collatz had many honors bestowed upon him in his lifetime, including:
He died in Varna
, Bulgaria, while attending a mathematics conference.
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
mathematician
Mathematician
A mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....
. In 1937 he posed the famous Collatz conjecture
Collatz conjecture
The Collatz conjecture is a conjecture in mathematics named after Lothar Collatz, who first proposed it in 1937. The conjecture is also known as the 3n + 1 conjecture, the Ulam conjecture , Kakutani's problem , the Thwaites conjecture , Hasse's algorithm The Collatz conjecture is a...
, which remains unsolved.
The Collatz-Wielandt formula for positive matrices important in the Perron–Frobenius theorem
Perron–Frobenius theorem
In linear algebra, the Perron–Frobenius theorem, proved by and , asserts that a real square matrix with positive entries has a unique largest real eigenvalue and that the corresponding eigenvector has strictly positive components, and also asserts a similar statement for certain classes of...
is named after him.
Collatz studied at different universities in Germany including the University of Berlin under Alfred Klose, receiving his doctorate in 1935 for a dissertation entitled Das Differenzenverfahren mit höherer Approximation für lineare Differentialgleichungen (The finite difference method with higher approximation for linear differential equations).
For his many contributions to the field, Collatz had many honors bestowed upon him in his lifetime, including:
- election to the German Academy of Scientists Leopoldina, the academy at Bologna and Modena in Italy.
- honorary member of the Hamburg Mathematical Society
- honorary degrees by the University of São PauloUniversity of São PauloUniversidade de São Paulo is a public university in the Brazilian state of São Paulo. It is the largest Brazilian university and one of the country's most prestigious...
, the Technical University of Vienna, the University of DundeeUniversity of DundeeThe University of Dundee is a university based in the city and Royal burgh of Dundee on eastern coast of the central Lowlands of Scotland and with a small number of institutions elsewhere....
in ScotlandScotlandScotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
, Brunel UniversityBrunel UniversityBrunel University is a public research university located in Uxbridge, London, United Kingdom. The university is named after the Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel....
in England, the Technical University of Hanover, and the Technical University of Dresden.
He died in Varna
Varna
Varna is the largest city and seaside resort on the Bulgarian Black Sea Coast and third-largest in Bulgaria after Sofia and Plovdiv, with a population of 334,870 inhabitants according to Census 2011...
, Bulgaria, while attending a mathematics conference.