| Carl Anton Bjerknes | |
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Carl Anton Bjerknes
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| Born | October 24, 1825 Oslo, Norway |
| Died | March 20, 1903 (aged 77) Oslo |
| Residence | Norway |
| Nationality | Norwegian |
| Fields | Mathematician, Physicist |
| Institutions | University of Oslo |
| Alma mater | University of Oslo |
| Known for | Hydrodynamics |
Carl Anton Bjerknes (October 24, 1825 – March 20, 1903) was a Norwegian mathematician and physicist. Bjerknes' earlier work was in pure mathematics, but he is principally known for his studies in hydrodynamics.[1]
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Carl Anton Bjerknes was born in Oslo, Norway. His father was Abraham Isaksen Bjerknes and his mother Elen Birgitte Holmen. Bjerknes studied mining at the University of Oslo, and after that mathematics at the University of Göttingen and the University of Paris. In 1866 he held a chair for applied mathematics and in 1869 for mathematics. Over a fifty year time period, Bjerknes taught mathematics at the University of Oslo and at the military college.
Influenced by Johann Peter Gustav Lejeune Dirichlet, Bjerknes worked for the rest of his life in the field of hydrodynamics. He tried to explain the electrodynamics of James Clerk Maxwell by hydrodynamical analogies and similarly he proposed a mechanical explanation of gravitation. Although he didn't succeeded in his attempts to explain all those things, his findings in the field of hydrodynamics were important. His experiments was shown at the electric exhibition in Paris in 1879 and the year at the Scandinavian naturalist meeting in Stockholm. His son Norwegian physicist and meteorologist, Vilhelm Bjerknes continued the work of his father.