Ferdinand Joachimsthal was a

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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 March 9, 1818, at Goldberg (

Złotoryja Złotoryja (; , ; Latin: ''Aureus Mons'', ''Aurum'') is a historic town in Lower Silesian Voivodeship in southwestern Poland, the administrative seat of Złotoryja County, and of the smaller Gmina Złotoryja. Złotoryja is the first town in Pola ...

Silesia Silesia (see names #Etymology, below) is a historical region of Central Europe that lies mostly within Poland, with small parts in the Czech Silesia, Czech Republic and Germany. Its area is approximately , and the population is estimated at 8, ...

and died on April 5, 1861, at Breslau (Wrocław). In the year of his graduation ( Ph.D.,

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, 1842) he was appointed teacher at a ''

Realschule Real school (, ) is a type of secondary school in Germany, Switzerland and Liechtenstein. It has also existed in Croatia (''realna gimnazija''), the Austrian Empire, the German Empire, Denmark and Norway (''realskole''), Sweden (''realskola''), F ...

'' in

, and in 1846 was admitted to the philosophical faculty of the university as ''

privatdozent ''Privatdozent'' (for men) or ''Privatdozentin'' (for women), abbreviated PD, P.D. or Priv.-Doz., is an academic title conferred at some European universities, especially in German-speaking countries, to someone who holds certain formal qualifi ...

''. In 1856, he was appointed

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...

of mathematics at Halle, and in 1858 at Breslau. Joachimsthal, who was

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, contributed essays to ''

Crelle's Journal ''Crelle's Journal'', or just ''Crelle'', is the common name for a mathematics journal, the ''Journal für die reine und angewandte Mathematik'' (in English: ''Journal for Pure and Applied Mathematics''). History The journal was founded by A ...

'', 1846, 1850, 1854, 1861, and to

Olry Terquem Olry Terquem (16 June 1782 – 6 May 1862) was a French mathematician. He is known for his works in geometry and for founding two scientific journals, one of which was the first journal about the history of mathematics. He was also the pseudony ...

's ''

Nouvelles Annales de Mathématiques The ''Nouvelles Annales de Mathématiques'' (subtitled ''Journal des candidats aux écoles polytechnique et normale'') was a French scientific journal in mathematics. It was established in 1842 by Olry Terquem and Camille-Christophe Gerono, and c ...

''. He is known for ''Joachimsthal's Equation'' and ''Joachimsthal Notation '', both associated with

conic section A conic section, conic or a quadratic curve is a curve obtained from a cone's surface intersecting a plane. The three types of conic section are the hyperbola, the parabola, and the ellipse; the circle is a special case of the ellipse, tho ...

s.See "Conics and Joachimthal's equation" in

Projective harmonic conjugate In projective geometry, the harmonic conjugate point of a point on the real projective line with respect to two other points is defined by the following construction: :Given three collinear points , let be a point not lying on their join and le ...

Works

* 1848: "Sur les normales infiniment voisines d'une surface courbe",

13: 415–22 * 1863:
Elemente der analytischen Geometrie der Ebene
' via

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* 1872:
Anwendung der Differential- und Integralrechnung
via Internet Archive

References

* * J.J. O'Conner & E.F. Robertson (2014
Ferdinand Joachimsthal
@ McTutor History of Mathematics Archive People from the Province of Silesia 19th-century German mathematicians Silesian Jews 1818 births 1861 deaths {{germany-mathematician-stub