Basil Gordon

{{short description|American mathematician}}

{{ Infobox scientist

| name = Basil Gordon

| image =

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| caption =

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1931|12|23|mf=y}}

| birth_place =

| death_date ={{Death date and age|2012|1|12|1931|12|23|mf=y}}

| death_place =

| nationality = American

| fields = Mathematics

| work_institutions =UCLA

| alma_mater = California Institute of Technology

| doctoral_advisor = Tom M. Apostol

| doctoral_students = Robert Guralnick
Ken Ono

| notable_students =

| known_for =

}}

Basil Gordon (December 23, 1931 – January 12, 2012) was a mathematician at UCLA, specializing in number theory and combinatorics.{{cite web|url=http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/latimes/obituary.aspx?n=basil-gordon&pid=155716795 |title=Basil Gordon Obituary: View Basil Gordon's Obituary by Los Angeles Times |publisher=Legacy.com |date= |accessdate=2012-03-23}} He obtained his Ph.D. at California Institute of Technology under the supervision of Tom Apostol. Ken Ono was one of his students.

Gordon is well known for Göllnitz–Gordon identities, generalizing the Rogers–Ramanujan identities.Krishnaswami Alladi (2013) [https://www.ams.org/notices/201307/rnoti-p856.pdf Remembering Basil Gordon], 1931-2012, NAMS 60(7), 856-865. He also posed the still-unsolved Gaussian moat problem in 1962.{{citation

| last1 = Gethner | first1 = Ellen

| last2 = Wagon | first2 = Stan | author2-link = Stan Wagon

| last3 = Wick | first3 = Brian

| doi = 10.2307/2589708

| issue = 4

| journal = The American Mathematical Monthly

| mr = 1614871

| pages = 327–337

| title = A stroll through the Gaussian primes

| volume = 105

| year = 1998| jstor = 2589708

}}.

Gordon was drafted into the US Army, where he worked with the former Nazi rocket scientist Wernher von Braun. Gordon's calculations of the gravitational interactions of earth, moon, and satellite contributed to the success and longevity of Explorer I, which launched in 1958 and remained in orbit until 1970.{{cite web|url=http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/latimes/obituary.aspx?n=basil-gordon&pid=155716795 |title=Basil Gordon Obituary: View Basil Gordon's Obituary by Los Angeles Times |publisher=Legacy.com |date= |accessdate=2012-08-16}} He was the step-grandson of General George Barnett and is a descendant of the Gordon family of British distillers, producers of Gordon's Gin.