Dedekind, Richard |
| MATHEMATICIAN (GERMANY) |
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BORN 6 Oct 1831, Braunschweig, Niedersachsen - DIED 12 Feb 1916, Braunschweig, Niedersachsen BIRTH NAME Dedekind, Julius Wilhelm Richard GRAVE LOCATION Braunschweig, Niedersachsen: Hauptfriedhof (29 / 2 FB 19) |
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Richard Dedekind was the son of the lawyer and teacher Julius Dedekind. He studied at the Collegium Carolinum in Braunschweig and continued his studies in Göttingen in 1850. He was the last pupil of Carl Gauss and in 1852 he was promoted on the theory of Eulerian Integrals. Among his teachers were Moritz Abraham Stern, Wilhelm Weber and Johann Benedict Listing. In 1854 he habilitated in Göttingen, shortly after his friend Bernhard Riemann. After Gauss died in 1855 he was succeeded by Peter Gustav Dirichlet and he and Dedekind soon became friends. In 1858 he was engaged at the Polytechnikum Zürich and from 1862 until 1894 he was professor of Mathematics in Braunschweig at the Technischen Hochschule. In 1872 he provided the first exact difinition of the real numbers using the so called Dedekind cuts in "Stetigkeit und Irrationalzahlen". The algebraic term 'ring' was introduced by him. He did pioneering work in the field of group theory. Dedekind refused several offers from well known universities because he wanted to stay in Braunschweig. His family lived there and he was unmarried himself. He died there in 1916. Related persons • was a friend of Dirichlet, Peter Gustave Lejeune • was pupil of Gauss, Carl Friedrich • was pupil of Weber, Wilhelm Eduard |
| Images |
 The grave of Richard Dedekind at the Hauptfriedhof, Braunschweig. Picture by Androom (24 Mar 2007) |
Sources • Richard Dedekind â Wikipedia |
