| Detlef Gromoll | |
|---|---|
| Born | 13 May 1938 Berlin, Germany |
| Died | 31 May 2008 (aged 70) Stony Brook, New York |
| Nationality | German American |
| Fields | Mathematics |
| Institutions | SUNY Stony Brook |
| Alma mater | University of Bonn |
| Doctoral advisor | Friedrich Hirzebruch |
| Doctoral students | Gabriel Paternain Gerard Walschap Guofang Wei |
Detlef Gromoll (13 May 1938 – 31 May 2008) was a mathematician who studied distortions of shapes in three or more dimensions. In his soul theorem, published in 1972, he and Jeff Cheeger studied the properties of surfaces that have flat regions or curves like the outside of a sphere but not regions shaped liked saddles. They found "the properties of such surfaces, infinite in extent and existing in any number of dimensions, could be deduced from a finite central core region".[1]
Gromoll was born in Berlin in 1938, and was a classically trained violinist. After living and attending school in Rosdorf, he obtained his Ph.D. in mathematics at the University of Bonn in 1964. Following sojourns at several universities, he joined the State University of New York at Stony Brook in 1969. He married Suzan L. Lemay on 29 December 1971, and they had three children together: Hans Christian (also a mathematician), Stefan, a physicist & cofounder of Scientific Media, and Heidi, currently training to be a physician.