constantin carathodory

Constantin Carathodory (September 13, 1873 – February 2, 1950) was a German mathematician of Greek origin. He made significant contributions to the theory of functions of a real variable, the calculus of variations, and measure theory. His work also includes important results in conformal representations and in the theory of boundary correspondence.

  Constantin Carathodory was born in Berlin and grew up in Brussels, where his father served as the Ottoman ambassador to Belgium. The Carathodory family was well-established and respected in Constantinople, and its members held many important governmental positions.

Carathodory entered the University of Berlin in 1900. In the years 1902-1904 he completed his graduate studies in the University of Gttingen under the supervision of Hermann Minkowski. During the years 1909-1920 he held various lecturing positions in Hannover, Breslau, Gttingen and Berlin. In 1920 Carathodory accepted a post in the University of Smyrna. He took a major part in establishing the institution, but his efforts ended in 1922 when the Greek population left the city after the Greco-Turkish War. Having been forced to move to Athens, Carathodory brought along with him some of the university library, thus saving it from destruction. He stayed at Athens and taught at the university and technical school until 1924. In 1924 Carathodory was appointed professor of mathematics at the University of Munich, and he held this position until his death in 1950. 1926 he gave a strict and general proof, that no system of lenses and mirrors can avoid Aberration, except for the trivial case of plane mirrors. Among other accomplishments, one should mention Carathodory's remarkable talent for languages. In addition to Greek and French as native languages, he published most of his works in German and also fluently spoke English, Italian and Turkish. Such an impressive linguistic arsenal enabled him to communicate and exchange ideas directly with other mathematicians during his numerous travels, and greatly extend his fields of knowledge. He is credited with the theories of outer measure, and prime ends, amongst other mathematical results.

Constantin Carathodory

See also