Paul H. Rabinowitz (born 1939) is the

Edward Burr Van Vleck Edward Burr Van Vleck (June 7, 1863 – June 2, 1943) was an American mathematician. Early life Van Vleck was born June 7, 1863, Middletown, Connecticut. He was the son of astronomer John Monroe Van Vleck, he graduated from Wesleyan University ...

Professor of

Mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

and a Vilas Research Professor at the

University of Wisconsin, Madison A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Univ ...

. He received a Ph.D. from

New York University New York University (NYU) is a private university, private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a Nondenominational ...

in 1966 under the direction of

Jürgen Moser Jürgen Kurt Moser (July 4, 1928 – December 17, 1999) was a German-American mathematician, honored for work spanning over four decades, including Hamiltonian dynamical systems and partial differential equations. Life Moser's mother Ilse Strehl ...

. From 1966 to 1969 he held a position as assistant professor at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

. He has visited many mathematical institutions all over the world (among them universities at Aarhus, Pisa, Paris and ETH in Zurich). In 1978 Paul Rabinowitz became a fellow of the

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation The John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation is a private foundation formed in 1925 by Olga and Simon Guggenheim in memory of their son, who died on April 26, 1922. The organization awards Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are Gr ...

. He works in the fields of

partial differential equations In mathematics, a partial differential equation (PDE) is an equation which involves a multivariable function and one or more of its partial derivatives. The function is often thought of as an "unknown" that solves the equation, similar to how ...

and nonlinear analysis. He is best known for his global

bifurcation Bifurcation or bifurcated may refer to: Science and technology * Bifurcation theory, the study of sudden changes in dynamical systems ** Bifurcation, of an incompressible flow, modeled by squeeze mapping the fluid flow * River bifurcation, the for ...

theorem and the

mountain pass theorem The mountain pass theorem is an existence theorem from the calculus of variations, originally due to Antonio Ambrosetti and Paul Rabinowitz. Given certain conditions on a function, the theorem demonstrates the existence of a saddle point. The theor ...

, the latter done jointly with Antonio Ambrosetti. However also the linking and saddle point theorems, results concerning the existence of periodic solutions to hamiltonian systems, variational methods in the theory of critical points of strongly indefinite functional, in collaboration with

Vieri Benci Vieri Benci (born May 9, 1949) is an Italian mathematician who worked at the University of Pisa. He has contributed to various fields of mathematics such as the partial differential equations (PDEs), mathematical physics, Hamiltonian dynamics, ...

, and under the absence of compactness conditions of the Palais–Smale type. Many other achievements of Paul Rabinowitz have found their place in the history of mathematics. He is the recipient of numerous honors and awards, including the

George David Birkhoff Prize The George David Birkhoff Prize in applied mathematics is awarded jointly by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) and the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) in honor of George David Birkhoff (1884–1944). It is currently aw ...

in 1998. He was elected as a member of the

United States National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

in 1998. In 2012 he became a fellow of the

American Mathematical Society The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meetings, ...

. In 2014 Paul Rabinowitz was awarded with the Juliusz Schauder Medal, the prize established by the Juliusz Schauder Center for Nonlinear Studies at the

Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń or NCU (, UMK) is located in Toruń, Poland. It is named after Nicolaus Copernicus, who was born in Toruń in 1473. History The beginnings of higher education in Toruń The first institution of higher ...

, Poland, in recognition of his important contribution in the field of topological methods in nonlinear analysis.

References and notes

External links

Paul Rabinowitz at the Mathematics Genealogy ProjectAnnouncement of Election to National AcademyJuliusz P. Schauder Center for Nonlinear Studies
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rabinowitz, Paul 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty 1939 births Living people Fellows of the American Mathematical Society Fellows of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Foreign members of the Russian Academy of Sciences