Theodore James "Ted" Courant is an American mathematician who has conducted research in the fields of

differential geometry Differential geometry is a Mathematics, mathematical discipline that studies the geometry of smooth shapes and smooth spaces, otherwise known as smooth manifolds. It uses the techniques of Calculus, single variable calculus, vector calculus, lin ...

and

classical mechanics Classical mechanics is a Theoretical physics, physical theory describing the motion of objects such as projectiles, parts of Machine (mechanical), machinery, spacecraft, planets, stars, and galaxies. The development of classical mechanics inv ...

. In particular, he made seminal contributions to the study of Dirac manifolds, which generalize both

symplectic manifold In differential geometry, a subject of mathematics, a symplectic manifold is a smooth manifold, M , equipped with a closed nondegenerate differential 2-form \omega , called the symplectic form. The study of symplectic manifolds is called sy ...

s and

Poisson manifold In differential geometry, a field in mathematics, a Poisson manifold is a smooth manifold endowed with a Poisson structure. The notion of Poisson manifold generalises that of symplectic manifold, which in turn generalises the phase space from Hami ...

s, and are related to the Dirac theory of constraints in physics. Some mathematical objects in this field have since been named after him, including the Courant bracket and

Courant algebroid In differential geometry, a field of mathematics, a Courant algebroid is a vector bundle together with an inner product and a compatible bracket more general than that of a Lie algebroid. It is named after Theodore James Courant, Theodore Courant, ...

Education and career

Courant received his B.A. degree from

Reed College Reed College is a Private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Portland, Oregon, United States. Founded in 1908, Reed is a residential college with a campus in the Eastmoreland, Portland, Oregon, E ...

, and his Ph.D. from

The University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after the Anglo-Irish philosopher George Berkeley ...

, where he was a student of

Alan Weinstein Alan David Weinstein (born 17 June 1943) is a professor of mathematics at the University of California, Berkeley, working in the field of differential geometry, and especially in Poisson manifold, Poisson geometry. Early life and education ...

. After teaching at the

University of California, Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California, United States. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of C ...

and the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

, Courant moved to secondary education at private schools in California including

The Branson School The Branson School (also known as Branson, Branson School, or KBS) is a co-educational College-preparatory school, college-preparatory high school for students in grades 9–12. The school has 370 students, and is located in Ross, California, no ...

and

Wildwood School Wildwood School is an independent progressive K–12 school located in Los Angeles. Wildwood was founded as an elementary school in 1971, by a group of parents led by a young lawyer named Belle Mason. The secondary campus (middle and high sch ...

Personal life

Ted Courant is the grandson of

Richard Courant Richard Courant (January 8, 1888 – January 27, 1972) was a German-American mathematician. He is best known by the general public for the book '' What is Mathematics?'', co-written with Herbert Robbins. His research focused on the areas of real ...

References

Reed College alumni University of California, Berkeley alumni 20th-century American mathematicians Living people Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century American mathematicians {{US-mathematician-stub