Paul Funk
{{Short description|Austrian mathematician}}
{{about||the United States Army lieutenant general|Paul E. Funk|the four-star general|Paul E. Funk II}}
Paul Georg Funk (14 April 1886, Vienna – 3 June 1969, Vienna) was an Austrian mathematician who introduced the Funk transform and who worked on the calculus of variations.
Biography
Born in Vienna in 1886, Paul Funk was the son of a deputy bank manager and went to high school in Baden and Gmunden. Then, studied mathematics in Tübingen, Vienna, and Göttingen, writing his PhD dissertation (Über Flächen mit lauter geschlossenen geodätischen Linien, 'On surfaces with many closed geodesic lines') under the supervision of David Hilbert.
He got his PhD in 1911 and spent the interwar years (1915-1939) in Prague as Professor of Mathematics at the {{ill|Deutsche Technische Hochschule Prag|de}}.{{cite journal|title="Kühler Abschied von Europa" – Wien 1938 und der Exodus der Mathematik|year=2001|publisher=Österreichische Mathematische Gesellschaft|page=72|language=German|url=https://www.oemg.ac.at/Tagungen/2001/KuehlerAbschied.pdf}} He became an associate professor in 1921 and a professor in 1927.
Suspended from his professorship in 1939 on account of his being Jewish, Funk was deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp in 1944, where he spent the last months of the war.{{cite book|title=Constantin Carathéodory: Mathematics and Politics in Turbulent Times|first=Maria|last=Georgiadou|year=2004|isbn=978-3-642-18562-5|doi=10.1007/978-3-642-18562-5|location=Berlin|publisher=Springer|page=425}} He was freed in 1945 and became professor at TU Wien.
He died in Vienna on 3 June, 1969. He was buried at Neustift Cemetery.
Major publications
- {{Citation | last1=Funk | first1=Paul | title=Variationsrechnung und ihre Anwendung in Physik und Technik | publisher=Springer-Verlag | location=Berlin, New York | language=German | series=Die Grundlehren der mathematischen Wissenschaften | isbn=978-3-540-04830-5 | mr=0152914 | year=1962 | volume=94}}
References
{{reflist}}
- {{cite journal| last1=Basch | first1=A. | title=Paul Funk zum 70. Geburtstag| mr=0080050 | year=1956 | journal=Österreich Ingenieur-Archiv| volume=10 | pages=117–119}}
- {{Citation | last1=Dann | first1=Susanna | title=On the Minkowski-Funk Transform | arxiv=1003.5565 | year=2010| bibcode=2010arXiv1003.5565D }}
- {{cite journal|first=S. H.|last=Hornich|year=1970|title=Nachruf auf Paul Funk|journal=Almanach der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien|volume=119|pages=271–277}}
- Maximilian Pinl: Kollegen in dunkler Zeit. Jahresbericht DMV Bd.75, 1974, S.172.
External links
- {{DNB-Portal|116873892}}
{{Authority control}}
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Category:20th-century Austrian mathematicians
Category:Mathematicians from Austria-Hungary
Category:Theresienstadt Ghetto survivors
Maple Transactions, Vol. 4 No. 3 (2024): Autumn Issue / Student Corner:
"An Investigation of the Funk Transform" by Tobias Funk from Claremont McKenna College who is also grand grandson of Paul Funk.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5206/mt.v4i3.21612