Willem Abraham Wythoff
| Willem Abraham Wythoff | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Willem Abraham Wijthoff 6 October 1865 Amsterdam |
| Died |
21 May 1939 (aged 73) Amsterdam |
| Nationality | Dutch |
| Fields | Mathematics |
| Alma mater | University of Amsterdam |
| Doctoral advisor | Diederik Korteweg |
| Known for | Wythoff's game, Wythoff construction, Wythoff symbol |
Willem Abraham Wythoff, born Wijthoff (Dutch pronunciation: [ʋɛithɔf]), (6 October 1865 – 21 May 1939) was a Dutch mathematician.
Biography
Wythoff was born in Amsterdam to Anna C. F. Kerkhoven and Abraham Willem Wijthoff,[1] who worked in a sugar refinery.[2] He studied at the University of Amsterdam, and earned his Ph.D. in 1898 under the supervision of Diederik Korteweg.[3]
Contributions
Wythoff is known in combinatorial game theory and number theory for his study of Wythoff's game, whose solution involves the Fibonacci numbers.[2] The Wythoff array, a two-dimensional array of numbers related to this game and to the Fibonacci sequence, is also named after him.[4][5]
In geometry, Wythoff is known for the Wythoff construction of uniform tilings and uniform polyhedra and for the Wythoff symbol used as a notation for these geometric objects.
Selected publications
- Wythoff, W. A. (1905–1907), "A modification of the game of nim", Nieuw Archief voor wiskunde, 2: 199–202.
- Wythoff, W. A. (1918), "A relation between the polytopes of the C600-family", Proceedings of the Section of Sciences, Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen te Amsterdam, 20: 966–970.
References
- ↑ W.A. Wijthoff genealogy
- 1 2 Stakhov, Alexey; Stakhov, Alekseĭ Petrovich; Olsen, Scott Anthony (2009), The Mathematics of Harmony: From Euclid to Contemporary Mathematics and Computer Science, K & E Series on Knots and Everything, 22, World Scientific, pp. 129–130, ISBN 9789812775825.
- ↑ Willem Abraham Wythoff at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
- ↑ Kimberling, Clark (1995), "The Zeckendorf array equals the Wythoff array" (PDF), Fibonacci Quarterly, 33 (1): 3–8.
- ↑ Morrison, D. R. (1980), "A Stolarsky array of Wythoff pairs", A Collection of Manuscripts Related to the Fibonacci Sequence (PDF), Santa Clara, Calif: The Fibonacci Association, pp. 134–136.