Carl Johannes Thomae (sometimes called ''Johannes Thomae'', ''Karl Johannes Thomae'', or ''Johannes Karl Thomae''; 11 December 1840 in

Laucha an der Unstrut Laucha an der Unstrut (, ) is a town in the Burgenlandkreis district, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It is situated on the river Unstrut, northwest of Naumburg and west of Freyburg. It is part of the ''Verbandsgemeinde'' (collective municipality) o ...

– 1 April 1921 in

Jena Jena (; ) is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in Germany and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 in ...

) was a German mathematician.

Biography

Thomae, son of Karl August Thomae (head master) and Emilie Gutsmuths, grew up in

and in 1864 attained a doctorate under Ernst Schering at the

University of Göttingen The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen (, commonly referred to as Georgia Augusta), is a Public university, public research university in the city of Göttingen, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1734 ...

. In 1866 Thomae attained the habilitation qualification at the University of Göttingen and one year later also at the

University of Halle Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (), also referred to as MLU, is a public research university in the cities of Halle and Wittenberg. It is the largest and oldest university in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. MLU offers German and i ...

. In the year 1874, Thomae married Anna Uhde in

Balgstädt Balgstädt () is a municipality in the Burgenlandkreis district, in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Since 2009 it has incorporated the former municipalities of Burkersroda, Größnitz and Hirschroda.University of Jena The University of Jena, officially the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (, abbreviated FSU, shortened form ''Uni Jena''), is a public research university located in Jena, Thuringia, Germany. The university was established in 1558 and is cou ...

. In 1892 he married his second wife Sophie Pröpper in Jena. One year later was born Susanne Thomae. In 1914 Thomae, at that time dean of the philosophical faculty at the University of Jena, retired. In 1921 he died in Jena after a short illness. Carl Johannes Thomae's research was concerned with function theory and with what German-speaking mathematicians often call "Epsilontik", the precise development of analysis, differential geometry, and topology using epsilon-neighborhoods in the style of

Weierstrass Karl Theodor Wilhelm Weierstrass (; ; 31 October 1815 – 19 February 1897) was a German mathematician often cited as the " father of modern analysis". Despite leaving university without a degree, he studied mathematics and trained as a school t ...

. The Thomae function, the Thomae transformation formula (''aka'', Thomae's transformation and Thomae's theorem), the Thomae formula for hyperelliptic curves, and the Sears–Thomae transformation formula are named after him. He called himself

Riemann Georg Friedrich Bernhard Riemann (; ; 17September 182620July 1866) was a German mathematician who made profound contributions to analysis, number theory, and differential geometry. In the field of real analysis, he is mostly known for the first ...

's student, although he never attended a lecture by Riemann.

Works

* * ''Elementare Theorie der analytischen Funktionen einer komplexen Veränderlichen''. Nebert, Halle (Saale) 1880.

References

External links

Leben und Werke von Carl Johannes Thomae

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Thomae, Carl Johannes 19th-century German mathematicians 1840 births 1921 deaths People from Laucha an der Unstrut University of Göttingen alumni University of Halle alumni Academic staff of the University of Jena 20th-century German mathematicians