Sharadchandra Shankar Shrikhande (19 October 1917 – 21 April 2020) was an Indian mathematician with notable achievements in

combinatorial mathematics Combinatorics is an area of mathematics primarily concerned with counting, both as a means and as an end to obtaining results, and certain properties of finite structures. It is closely related to many other areas of mathematics and has many a ...

. He was notable for his breakthrough work along with

R. C. Bose Raj Chandra Bose (or Basu) (19 June 1901 – 31 October 1987) was an Indian American mathematician and statistician best known for his work in design theory, finite geometry and the theory of error-correcting codes in which the class of BCH c ...

and

E. T. Parker Ernest Tilden Parker (1926–1991) was a professor emeritus of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He is notable for his breakthrough work along with R. C. Bose and S. S. Shrikhande in their disproof of the famous conjecture made by Leo ...

in their disproof of the famous conjecture made by

Leonhard Euler Leonhard Euler ( ; ; ; 15 April 170718 September 1783) was a Swiss polymath who was active as a mathematician, physicist, astronomer, logician, geographer, and engineer. He founded the studies of graph theory and topology and made influential ...

dated 1782 that there do not exist two mutually

orthogonal In mathematics, orthogonality (mathematics), orthogonality is the generalization of the geometric notion of ''perpendicularity''. Although many authors use the two terms ''perpendicular'' and ''orthogonal'' interchangeably, the term ''perpendic ...

latin square Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area around Rome, Italy. Through the expansion o ...

s of order 4n + 2 for any n. Shrikhande's specialties were combinatorics and statistical designs. The

Shrikhande graph In the mathematical field of graph theory, the Shrikhande graph is a graph discovered by S. S. Shrikhande in 1959.. It is a strongly regular graph with 16 vertices and 48 edges, with each vertex having degree 6. Every pair of nodes has ...

is used in statistical design.

Life, education and career

He was the fifth of ten siblings. His father worked at a flour mill. He completed his B.Sc. from Government Science College, Nagpur and went for further studies at the

Indian Statistical Institute The Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) is a public research university headquartered in Kolkata, India with centers in New Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai and Tezpur. It was declared an Institute of National Importance by the Government of India und ...

. He then briefly worked as a lecturer at the Government Science College, Nagpur. Shrikhande received a Ph.D. in the year 1950 from the

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC, UNC Chapel Hill, or simply Carolina) is a public research university in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States. Chartered in 1789, the university first began enrolling students in 1795, ...

under the supervision of

Raj Chandra Bose Raj Chandra Bose (or Basu) (19 June 1901 – 31 October 1987) was an Indian American mathematician and statistician best known for his work in design theory, finite geometry and the theory of error-correcting codes in which the class of BCH c ...

. Shrikhande taught at various universities in the US and in India. Shrikhande was a professor of mathematics at

Banaras Hindu University Banaras Hindu University (BHU), formerly Benares Hindu University, is a collegiate, central, and research university located in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India, and founded in 1916. The university incorporated the Central Hindu College, ...

, Banaras, and the founding head of the department of mathematics,

University of Mumbai University of Mumbai is a public state university in Mumbai. It is one of the largest university systems in the world with over 549,000 students on its campuses and affiliated colleges. , the university had 711 affiliated colleges. It was est ...

and the founding director of the Center of Advanced Study in Mathematics, Mumbai until he retired in 1978. He was a fellow of the

Indian National Science Academy The Indian National Science Academy (INSA) is a national academy in New Delhi New Delhi (; ) is the Capital city, capital of India and a part of the Delhi, National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three b ...

, the

Indian Academy of Sciences The Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore was founded by Indian Physicist and List of Nobel laureates, Nobel Laureate Chandrasekhara Venkata Raman, C. V. Raman, and was registered as a society on 27 April 1934. Inaugurated on 31 July 1934, it ...

and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, USA. In 1988, his wife Shakuntala died and he moved to the United States. Shrikhande returned to India in 2009. He

turned 100 A centenarian is a person who has reached the age of 100. Because life expectancies at birth worldwide are well below 100, the term is invariably associated with longevity. The United Nations estimated that there were 316,600 living centenarian ...

in October 2017 and died in April 2020 at the age of 102.Indian Maths Genius Who Debunked Euler’s Theory, Made it to NYT Front Page Dies at 103
/ref> His son Mohan Shrikhande
/ref> is a professor of combinatorial mathematics at

Central Michigan University Central Michigan University (CMU) is a Public university, public research university in Mount Pleasant, Michigan, United States. It was established in 1892 as a private normal school and became a state institution in 1895. CMU is one of the eigh ...

in Mt. Pleasant,

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Shrikhande, Sharadchandra Shankar 1917 births 2020 deaths 20th-century Indian mathematicians Fellows of the Indian Academy of Sciences Indian men centenarians Indian combinatorialists Indian statisticians Latin squares Scientists from Madhya Pradesh University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill alumni University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill faculty