Sergei Vasilyevich Fomin (; 9 December 1917 – 17 August 1975) was a
Soviet
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
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 ...
who was co-author with
Andrey Kolmogorov
Andrey Nikolaevich Kolmogorov ( rus, Андре́й Никола́евич Колмого́ров, p=ɐnˈdrʲej nʲɪkɐˈlajɪvʲɪtɕ kəlmɐˈɡorəf, a=Ru-Andrey Nikolaevich Kolmogorov.ogg, 25 April 1903 – 20 October 1987) was a Soviet ...
of ''Introductory real analysis'', and co-author with
Israel Gelfand of ''Calculus of Variations'' (1963),
[.] both books that are widely read in Russian and in English.
Fomin entered
Moscow State University
Moscow State University (MSU), officially M. V. Lomonosov Moscow State University,. is a public university, public research university in Moscow, Russia. The university includes 15 research institutes, 43 faculties, more than 300 departments, a ...
at the age of 16. His first paper was published at 19 on infinite
abelian group
In mathematics, an abelian group, also called a commutative group, is a group in which the result of applying the group operation to two group elements does not depend on the order in which they are written. That is, the group operation is commu ...
s. After his graduation he worked with Kolmogorov. He was drafted during
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 ...
, after which he returned to Moscow.
When the war ended Fomin returned to Moscow State University and joined
Andrey Tikhonov Andrey Tikhonov may refer to:
* Andrey Tikhonov (footballer) (born 1970), Russian football manager and footbeller
* Andrey Tikhonov (mathematician) (1906–1993), Soviet Russian mathematician and geophysicist
* Andrey Tikhonov (runner) (born ...
's department. In 1951 he was awarded his habilitation for a dissertation on
dynamical system
In mathematics, a dynamical system is a system in which a Function (mathematics), function describes the time dependence of a Point (geometry), point in an ambient space, such as in a parametric curve. Examples include the mathematical models ...
s with invariant measure. Two years later he was appointed a professor. Later in life, he became involved with mathematical aspects of biology.
The American mathematician
Paul Halmos
Paul Richard Halmos (; 3 March 1916 – 2 October 2006) was a Kingdom of Hungary, Hungarian-born United States, American mathematician and probabilist who made fundamental advances in the areas of mathematical logic, probability theory, operat ...
wrote the following about Fomin:
''Some of the mathematical interests of Sergei Vasilovich were always close to some of mine (measure and ergodic theory); he supervised the translation of a couple of my books into Russian. We had corresponded before we met, and it was a pleasure to shake hands with a man instead of reading a letter. Three or four years later he came to visit me in Hawaii, and it was a pleasure to see him enjoy, in contrast to Moscow, the warm sunshine''.
Fomin died in
Vladivostok
Vladivostok ( ; , ) is the largest city and the administrative center of Primorsky Krai and the capital of the Far Eastern Federal District of Russia. It is located around the Zolotoy Rog, Golden Horn Bay on the Sea of Japan, covering an area o ...
.
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Fomin, Sergei
Fomin, Sergey V.
Fomin, Sergey V.
Fomin, Sergey V.
Fomin, Sergey V.
Moscow State University alumni
Academic staff of Moscow State University
Functional analysts