Roberto Marcolongo (August 28, 1862 in

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

– May 16, 1943 in Rome) was an

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, a Romance ethnic group related to or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance languag ...

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 ...

, known for his research in

vector calculus Vector calculus or vector analysis is a branch of mathematics concerned with the differentiation and integration of vector fields, primarily in three-dimensional Euclidean space, \mathbb^3. The term ''vector calculus'' is sometimes used as a ...

and

theoretical physics Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that employs mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to rationalize, explain, and predict List of natural phenomena, natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental p ...

Biography

Marcolongo graduated in 1886, and later he was an assistant of Valentino Cerruti in Rome. In 1895 he became professor of rational mechanics at the University of Messina. In 1908 he moved to the

University of Naples The University of Naples Federico II (; , ) is a public university, public research university in Naples, Campania, Italy. Established in 1224 and named after its founder, Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, Frederick II, it is the oldest public, s ...

, where he remained until retirement in 1935. He worked on

together with

Cesare Burali-Forti Cesare Burali-Forti (13 August 1861 – 21 January 1931) was an Italian mathematician, after whom the Burali-Forti paradox is named. He was a prolific writer, with 180 publications. Biography Burali-Forti was born in Arezzo, and he obtained hi ...

, which was then known as "Italian notation". In 1906 he wrote an early work which used the four-dimensional formalism to account for relativistic invariance under

Lorentz transformation In physics, the Lorentz transformations are a six-parameter family of Linear transformation, linear coordinate transformation, transformations from a Frame of Reference, coordinate frame in spacetime to another frame that moves at a constant vel ...

s. In 1921 he published to

Messina Messina ( , ; ; ; ) is a harbour city and the capital city, capital of the Italian Metropolitan City of Messina. It is the third largest city on the island of Sicily, and the 13th largest city in Italy, with a population of 216,918 inhabitants ...

one of the first treaties on the special relativity and general, where he used the absolute differential calculus without coordinates, developed with Burali-Forti, as opposed to the absolute differential calculus with coordinates of

Tullio Levi-Civita Tullio Levi-Civita, (; ; 29 March 1873 – 29 December 1941) was an Italian mathematician, most famous for his work on absolute differential calculus ( tensor calculus) and its applications to the theory of relativity, but who also made signifi ...

and

Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro (; 12January 1925) was an Italian mathematician. He is most famous as the discoverer of tensor calculus. With his former student Tullio Levi-Civita, he wrote his most famous single publication, a pioneering work on the ...

. He was a member of the

Accademia dei Lincei The (; literally the "Academy of the Lynx-Eyed"), anglicised as the Lincean Academy, is one of the oldest and most prestigious European scientific institutions, located at the Palazzo Corsini on the Via della Lungara in Rome, Italy. Founded in ...

and other Italian academies.

Works

*
Teoria matematica dello equilibrio dei corpi elastici
' (Milano: U. Hoepli, 1904) *
Meccanica razionale
' (Milano: U. Hoepli, 1905) * ''Elementi di Calcolo vettoriale con numerose Applicazioni'' (with Burali-Forti) (Bologna, Nicola Zanichelli, 1909)
''Omografie vettoriali con Applicazioni''
(with Burali-Forti) (Torino, G. B. Petrini, 1909) *
Analyse vectorielle générale: Transformations linéaires
' (with

, translated into French by Paul Baridon) (Pavia: Mattei & C., 1913)
Analyse vectorielle générale: Applications à la mécanique et à la physique
(in French, with

and Tommaso Boggio) (Pavia:Mattei & C., 1913)
''Il Problema dei Tre Corpi da Newton ai Nostri Giorni''
(Milano, Ulrico Hoepli, 1919)
''Relatività''
(Messina, G. Principato, 1921)

References

External links

by Francesco Tricomi. {{DEFAULTSORT:Marcolongo, Roberto 1862 births 1943 deaths 19th-century Italian mathematicians 20th-century Italian mathematicians