Pertti Esko Juhani Mattila (born 28 March 1948) is a Finnish
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 ...
working in
geometric measure theory
In mathematics, geometric measure theory (GMT) is the study of geometric properties of sets (typically in Euclidean space) through measure theory. It allows mathematicians to extend tools from differential geometry to a much larger class of surfac ...
,
complex analysis
Complex analysis, traditionally known as the theory of functions of a complex variable, is the branch of mathematical analysis that investigates functions of complex numbers. It is helpful in many branches of mathematics, including algebraic ...
and
harmonic analysis
Harmonic analysis is a branch of mathematics concerned with investigating the connections between a function and its representation in frequency. The frequency representation is found by using the Fourier transform for functions on unbounded do ...
.
He is Professor of Mathematics in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at the
University of Helsinki
The University of Helsinki (, ; UH) is a public university in Helsinki, Finland. The university was founded in Turku in 1640 as the Royal Academy of Åbo under the Swedish Empire, and moved to Helsinki in 1828 under the sponsorship of Alexander ...
, Finland.
He is known for his work on
geometric measure theory
In mathematics, geometric measure theory (GMT) is the study of geometric properties of sets (typically in Euclidean space) through measure theory. It allows mathematicians to extend tools from differential geometry to a much larger class of surfac ...
and in particular applications to
complex analysis
Complex analysis, traditionally known as the theory of functions of a complex variable, is the branch of mathematical analysis that investigates functions of complex numbers. It is helpful in many branches of mathematics, including algebraic ...
and
harmonic analysis
Harmonic analysis is a branch of mathematics concerned with investigating the connections between a function and its representation in frequency. The frequency representation is found by using the Fourier transform for functions on unbounded do ...
. His work include a counterexample to the general
Vitushkin's conjecture and with Mark Melnikov and Joan Verdera he introduced new techniques to understand the geometric structure of removable sets for complex analytic functions which together with other works in the field eventually led to the solution of
Painlevé's problem by Xavier Tolsa.
His book ''Geometry of Sets and Measures in Euclidean Spaces: Fractals and Rectifiability''
is now a widely cited
and a standard textbook in this field. Mattila has been the leading figure on creating the geometric measure theory school in Finland and the
Mathematics Genealogy Project
The Mathematics Genealogy Project (MGP) is a web-based database for the academic genealogy of mathematicians.. it contained information on 300,152 mathematical scientists who contributed to research-level mathematics. For a typical mathematicia ...
cites he has supervised so far 15 PhD students in the field.
He obtained his PhD from the
University of Helsinki
The University of Helsinki (, ; UH) is a public university in Helsinki, Finland. The university was founded in Turku in 1640 as the Royal Academy of Åbo under the Swedish Empire, and moved to Helsinki in 1828 under the sponsorship of Alexander ...
under the supervision of Jussi Väisälä in 1973. He worked at the
Institute for Advanced Study
The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry located in Princeton, New Jersey. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholars, including Albert Ein ...
at the
Princeton University
Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...
for postdoctoral research in 1979 and from 1989 as Professor of Mathematics at the
University of Jyväskylä
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". U ...
,
until appointed as Professor of Mathematics at the
University of Helsinki
The University of Helsinki (, ; UH) is a public university in Helsinki, Finland. The university was founded in Turku in 1640 as the Royal Academy of Åbo under the Swedish Empire, and moved to Helsinki in 1828 under the sponsorship of Alexander ...
in 2003.
In 1998 he was an Invited Speaker of the
International Congress of Mathematicians
The International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) is the largest conference for the topic of mathematics. It meets once every four years, hosted by the International Mathematical Union (IMU).
The Fields Medals, the IMU Abacus Medal (known before ...
in Berlin.
Mattila was the director of the
Academy of Finland
The Research Council of Finland (, ) is a governmental funding body for scientific research in Finland. Until August 2023, its official English-language name was Academy of Finland. It is based in Helsinki. Yearly, the council administers over ...
funded Centre of Excellence of Geometric Analysis and Mathematical Physics from 2002 to 2007 and currently part of the Centre of Excellence in Analysis and Dynamics Research in the University of Helsinki.
References
Bibliography
*
External links
Personal web page*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mattila, Pertti
1948 births
Living people
University of Helsinki alumni
Academic staff of the University of Helsinki
21st-century Finnish mathematicians
20th-century Finnish mathematicians