Gu chaohao
For more than 60 years, from differential geometry to partial differential equations, and then from partial differential equations to mathematical physics, he wandered in the abstruse and abstract world of mathematics, and made pioneering, arduous and internationally leading achievements in the fields of pure mathematics and applied mathematics. When many people think mathematics is boring, he said, "The world of mathematics is full of spiritual creation. Go deep into it and you will find endless mysteries. "
He is a famous mathematician and academician Gu Chaohao who won the highest national science and technology award in 2009. His life is full of many legends.
Bravely shoulder the national mission of youth
Gu Chaohao, 1926 was born in Zhejiang, and he was a smart and studious person since he was a child. He constantly witnessed the tragic scene of the country being invaded, and determined his ideal of devoting himself to the revolutionary cause very early. As a student, he actively participated in the national salvation movement and 1940 joined the China * * * Production Party.
During my college years, I actively participated in the progressive student movement and won the trust and respect of teachers and students with excellent results and practical actions in pursuit of truth. On the eve of liberation, he also contributed to the preservation of scientific and technological institutions in Hangzhou.
From 65438 to 0946, Gu Chaohao began to study mathematics under the famous mathematician Professor Su, and in the following ten years, he conducted a series of in-depth research work in K exhibition space, affine contact space and Finsler space, and quickly became the academic backbone of China differential geometry school headed by Su.
Constantly challenge yourself
1956 While Gu Chaohao has made remarkable achievements in differential geometry, he is keenly aware of the new requirements put forward by the development of cutting-edge technology for mathematics. In order to meet the needs of national scientific development, he resolutely devoted his main energy to the new research field of partial differential equations.
He devoted himself to applying mathematics to space flight. Through his repeated design and selection, he played a leading role in the calculation of "supersonic flow around a blunt body" in China and made contributions to China's national defense research.
Gu Chaohao devoted his life to three research fields-differential geometry, partial differential equations and mathematical physics, which he affectionately called the "Golden Triangle". Among them, his prediction of the development trend of partial differential equations has not only been confirmed by the mainstream development of partial differential equations in the world, but also guided and led a group of students to embark on their own research path.
Kang Feng
Freeman, a mathematical physicist? Dyson wrote in the article Birds and Frogs: Some mathematicians are like birds, while others are like frogs. Birds soar in the sky and roam in the vast land of mathematics, extending in all directions. They focus on concepts that can unify our thinking, and often link scattered problems in different parts of the region. Frogs live in the mud and can't see anything except the flowers growing nearby. They pay attention to the details of special goals and solve only one problem at a time.
He is both a bird and a frog. As a frog, his scientific research achievements are remarkable. As a bird, he can look at atomic bombs, missiles and satellites from a higher mathematical perspective.
He is Feng Kang.
Perhaps many people are not as familiar with this name as Hua and Chen Jingrun, but he is one of the few mathematicians with world-class influence in China.
At the same time, he is also the founder of computational mathematics research. His independent creation of finite element method, naturalisation and natural boundary element method has opened up a new field of symplectic geometry and symplectic scheme research, and made great contributions to the establishment and guidance of computational mathematics team in China.
Strong self-study ability
1920, Feng Kang was born in Jiangsu province. Feng Kang's achievements in computational mathematics come from his unremitting efforts and his strong self-study ability.
When Feng Kang was a student, the school offered English classes, but only in the classroom, without oral training and cultural background supplement. Feng Kang was keenly aware of the problem. He not only learns English well in class, but also pays attention to self-study after class.
In his spare time, he often translates some literary works from Selected High School English into Chinese. At the beginning of the Anti-Japanese War, the school library was bombed. Feng Kang once found an English book "Collection of World's Great Novelists" among the ruins and ashes. He regarded it as a treasure and read it with relish. Later, he supplemented his English study with English newspapers and movies.
Establishment of finite element method
In 1950s, the Computing Institute of Chinese Academy of Sciences undertook the calculation of Liujiaxia dam project of the Yellow River, but researchers put a lot of energy into it, but the progress was slow. Feng Kang thought of different calculation ideas for this problem-difference calculation ideas based on variational principle. This set of innovative calculation methods for solving boundary value problems of partial differential equations is what is called "finite element method" internationally.
This method not only successfully solved the calculation problem of Liujiaxia dam project, but also brought light to the research institute after a long darkness, making the research methods of computational mathematics more diversified. It represented the most advanced level in the world at that time, and was called the great achievement that modern mathematics in China could be comparable to that in western countries.
Missiles, nuclear bombs, and the artificial satellite
The former Party Secretary of China Academy of Sciences wrote in the article "Memories of China Academy of Sciences and" Two Bombs and One Satellite "published by People's Daily on May 6, 1999:" The real heroes of "Two Bombs and One Satellite" are Wang, the famous physicists of the Atomic Energy Institute Peng Huanwu and Zhu Hongyuan, and the mathematicians of the Academy of Sciences ... Please remember them in history! "Yes, history should remember them.
Feng Kang is not only an outstanding mathematician, but also a hero of "two bombs and one satellite". The trio of He, Hua and China became the "Troika" of mathematics. But his devotion to "two bombs and one satellite" has always been a secret and the cornerstone of silence.
Cheng dongyou
As a tenured professor at Harvard University and an internationally renowned mathematician, he has won three top prizes in the world, namely the Fields Prize, the Wolf Prize and the Clifford Prize, but none of them are important to him. He is very concerned about the education and training of the younger generation in China. He thinks this is not an obligation, but a responsibility!
His name is Qiu Chengtong and he was born in Guangdong. 1949. Qiu Chengtong proved Calabi's conjecture. Calabi-Hill manifold named after him is the basic concept of string theory in physics, and he has made important contributions to the development of differential geometry and mathematical physics.
Prove Calabi conjecture
Qiu Chengtong's mathematical work profoundly changed and greatly expanded the role of partial differential equations in differential geometry, and influenced many fields of mathematics and physics such as topology, algebraic geometry, representation theory and general relativity.
Solving Calabi conjecture has important application in algebraic geometry. It is proved that a simply connected Kahler manifold with illegal cross-sectional curvature must be doubly holomorphic and equivalent to a complex Euclidean space, and the analytical proof of Frankel conjecture is given. Under various Ricci curvature conditions, the first and second eigenvalues of Laplacian on compact Riemannian manifolds are estimated.
Pay attention to the development of mathematics in China.
Qiu Chengtong has always been very concerned about China's mathematics career. Since 1984, he has recruited more than a dozen doctoral students in China to train talents in differential geometry for China. His approach is not only to teach students some special skills, but also to teach them how to understand the incisiveness of mathematics. Since 1979, Qiu Chengtong has given many high-quality lectures at China Academy of Sciences.
Although Qiu Chengtong grew up in Hongkong, he was born in Chinese mainland and was deeply influenced by the traditional culture of China. He firmly believed that it was his responsibility to help China promote the development of mathematics.
From these mathematicians, we can see the mission and responsibility of young people. They care about the fate of the country, study science hard and devote all their energy to the motherland. As young people in the new era, we should learn their spiritual quality, study professional knowledge hard, cultivate scientific spirit, care about national social development and pay attention to scientific progress!
(The content is reproduced by Mathematical Jingwei)