was a Japanese

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...

and

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

. He was born on

Sado Island is an island located in the eastern part of the Sea of Japan, under the jurisdiction of Sado City, Niigata Prefecture, Japan, with a coastline of . In October 2017, Sado Island had a population of 55,212 people. Sado Island covers an area of ...

in 1927. He graduated from Utsunomiya Agricultural College in 1948. He began to write poems from the day after Japan had ended its role in

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. Being inspired from

surrealism Surrealism is an art movement, art and cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists aimed to allow the unconscious mind to express itself, often resulting in the depiction of illogical or dreamlike s ...

and

Heidegger Martin Heidegger (; 26 September 1889 – 26 May 1976) was a German philosopher known for contributions to phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. His work covers a range of topics including metaphysics, art, and language. In April ...

, he wrote poems that ask the meaning of

being Existence is the state of having being or reality in contrast to nonexistence and nonbeing. Existence is often contrasted with essence: the essence of an entity is its essential features or qualities, which can be understood even if one do ...

. He was part of the VOU and Arechi poetry groups, and was awarded the Attilio Bertolucci Award for his poetry. Takano also discovered a

Machin-like formula In mathematics, Machin-like formulas are a popular technique for computing pi, (the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle) to a approximations of pi, large number of digits. They are generalizations of John Machin's formula from ...

for calculating pi.Machin's Formula and Pi
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Selected bibliography

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Takano, Kikuo 20th-century Japanese mathematicians 21st-century Japanese mathematicians People from Niigata Prefecture 2006 deaths 1927 births 20th-century Japanese poets Scientists from Niigata Prefecture