Gertrude Ehrlich (born January 7, 1923) is an Austrian-American mathematician, specializing in

abstract algebra In mathematics, more specifically algebra, abstract algebra or modern algebra is the study of algebraic structures, which are set (mathematics), sets with specific operation (mathematics), operations acting on their elements. Algebraic structur ...

and

algebraic number theory Algebraic number theory is a branch of number theory that uses the techniques of abstract algebra to study the integers, rational numbers, and their generalizations. Number-theoretic questions are expressed in terms of properties of algebraic ob ...

. She is a professor emerita of mathematics at the

University of Maryland, College Park The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland, United States. Founded in 1856, UMD i ...

Early life and education

Ehrlich was born on January 7, 1923, in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

, the daughter of Jewish lawyer Josef Ehrlich and his wife Charlotte, née Kobak. In the late 1930s, she became a student at the Chajes Gymnasium, a special high school in Vienna for Jewish honor students; her classmates included future Nobel laureate

Walter Kohn Walter Kohn (; March 9, 1923 – April 19, 2016) was an Austrian-American theoretical physicist and theoretical chemist. He was awarded, with John Pople, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1998. The award recognized their contributions to the un ...

and mathematicians Rodolfo Permutti and Karl Greger. She was able to escape Nazi-occupied Austria in 1939, traveling with her mother, her older sister Margarete Ehrlich (a philosophy student and later radiographer) and aunt Mathilde Ehrlich (a painter) to the US on the '' SS Statendam'' in July 1939; her father rejoined them a year later. They lived for the next several years with her uncle Benedict Kobak in

Atlanta Atlanta ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Georgia (U.S. state), most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia. It is the county seat, seat of Fulton County, Georg ...

. She became a US citizen in 1945. She graduated from the

Georgia State College for Women Georgia College & State University (Georgia College or GCSU) is a public liberal arts university in Milledgeville, Georgia, United States. The university enrolls approximately 7,000 students and is a member of the University System of Georgi ...

in 1943, and earned a master's degree from the

University of North Carolina The University of North Carolina is the Public university, public university system for the state of North Carolina. Overseeing the state's 16 public universities and the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics, it is commonly referre ...

in 1945. She completed her Ph.D. in 1953 at the

University of Tennessee The University of Tennessee, Knoxville (or The University of Tennessee; UT; UT Knoxville; or colloquially UTK or Tennessee) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Knoxville, Tennessee, United St ...

. Her dissertation, ''The Structure of Continuous Rings'', was supervised by

Wallace Givens James Wallace Givens, Jr. (December 14, 1910 – March 5, 1993) was a mathematician and a pioneer in computer science. He is the eponym of the well-known Givens rotations. Born the son of two teachers in Alberene, Virginia (a small town near Cha ...

Contributions

Ehrlich is the author of the book ''Fundamental Concepts of Abstract Algebra'' (PWS-Kent Publishing, 1991; Dover, 2011). She is the coauthor of ''The Structure of the Real Number System'' (with Leon Warren Cohen, D. Van Nostrand, 1963) and of ''Algebra'' (with Jacob Goldhaber, Macmillan, 1970; Robert E. Krieger Publishing, 1980). In 1964 she became editor of the "Classroom Notes" department of ''

The American Mathematical Monthly ''The American Mathematical Monthly'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal of mathematics. It was established by Benjamin Finkel in 1894 and is published by Taylor & Francis on behalf of the Mathematical Association of America. It is an exposito ...

''. She was the first organizer of the University of Maryland High School Mathematics Competition, held annually for high school students in

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It borders the states of Virginia to its south, West Virginia to its west, Pennsylvania to its north, and Delaware to its east ...

and the

District of Columbia Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and Federal district of the United States, federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from ...

, starting in 1979. The concept of a morphic group comes from a 1976 research paper of Ehrlich, "Units and one-sided units in regular rings", in the ''

Transactions of the American Mathematical Society The ''Transactions of the American Mathematical Society'' is a monthly peer-reviewed scientific journal of pure and applied mathematics published by the American Mathematical Society. It was established in 1900. As a requirement, all articles must ...

'', and Ehrlich's theorem on the

endomorphism In mathematics, an endomorphism is a morphism from a mathematical object to itself. An endomorphism that is also an isomorphism is an automorphism. For example, an endomorphism of a vector space is a linear map , and an endomorphism of a g ...

s of morphic groups, from the same paper, is named for her.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ehrlich, Gertrude 1923 births Living people Jewish emigrants from Austria after the Anschluss to the United States 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Austrian mathematicians Austrian women scientists Georgia College & State University alumni University of North Carolina alumni University of Tennessee alumni University of Maryland, College Park faculty American women centenarians 21st-century American women mathematicians 20th-century American women mathematicians Jewish centenarians