Sheila Scott Macintyre
{{short description|Scottish mathematician}}
{{EngvarB|date=March 2017}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=January 2025}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name = Sheila Scott Macintyre
| honorific_suffix = FRSE
| image = Photo of Sheila Scott Macintyre.jpg
| alt = Photograph of Sheila Scott Macintyre
| caption =
| birth_name = Sheila Scott
| birth_date = {{birth date|1910|4|23|df=y}}
| birth_place = Edinburgh, Scotland
| death_date = {{death date and age|1960|3|21|1910|4|23|df=y}}
| death_place = Cincinnati, Ohio, US
| fields = mathematics
| workplaces = {{unbulleted list|University of Aberdeen|University of Cincinnati}}
| alma_mater = {{unbulleted list|Edinburgh Ladies' College|University of Edinburgh|Girton College, Cambridge}}
| thesis_title = Some Problems in Interpolatory Function Theory
| thesis_year = 1947
| resting_place_coordinates =
| other_names =
| years_active =
| doctoral_advisor = Edward Maitland Wright
| known_for = work on the Whittaker function
| notable_works =
| awards =
| spouse = {{marriage|Archibald James Macintyre|1940}}
}}
Sheila Scott Macintyre FRSE (23 April 1910 – 21 March 1960) was a Scottish mathematician best known for her work on the Whittaker constant. Macintyre is also known for co-authoring a German–English mathematics dictionary with Edith Witte.
Education
File:69 Dudley Avenue, Edinburgh.jpg
Sheila Scott was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on 23 April 1910, the daughter of Helen Myers Meldrum and James Alexander Scott. The family lived at 24 Dudley Avenue close to Trinity Academy, where her father was a teacher.Edinburgh and Leith Post Office Directory 1910-11
She attended Trinity Academy, Edinburgh, during which time her father was appointed rector of the academy. Between 1926 and 1928 she attended Edinburgh Ladies' College (now The Mary Erskine School), where she graduated as dux in mathematics and joint dux of the college. She studied at the University of Edinburgh, graduating in 1932 with an MA in mathematics and natural philosophy. Afterwards, she continued her studies at Girton College, Cambridge, taking the Mathematical Tripos.{{cite news|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=b1VRAAAAIBAJ&sjid=JjQNAAAAIBAJ&pg=2624%2C4786321 |title=Cambridge scholarship for Scotswoman |work=The Glasgow Herald |date=2 April 1932 |page=7 |accessdate=14 November 2017}} In her final year at the university she worked on a research project under the supervision of Mary Cartwright. This resulted in her first published work On the Asymptotic Periods of Integral Functions{{cite journal|last=Scott|first=Sheila|title=On the Asymptotic Periods of Integral Functions|journal=Mathematical Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical Society|year=1935|volume=31|issue=4|pages=543–554|doi=10.1017/s0305004100013542|bibcode=1935PCPS...31..543S|s2cid=122650821 }}.
Career
Between 1934 and 1940 Scott taught mathematics at a number of schools. During this period Edmund Whittaker introduced Scott to fellow mathematician Archibald James Macintyre. The two married in 1940, and shortly after she was appointed as an assistant lecturer at the University of Aberdeen, where her husband was a lecturer. During this time she began working on her doctoral thesis. While pregnant with her second child, she stopped teaching but continued research. She received her PhD from Aberdeen in 1947 with the thesis Some Problems in Interpolatory Function Theory and under the supervision of Edward Maitland Wright.[http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Biographies/Macintyre.html Sheila Scott Macintyre] School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of St. Andrews, Retrieved 3 October 2014
Between 1947 and 1958 she published another 10 papers during a period where the couple had three children: Alister William Macintyre (born 1944), Douglas (born 1946 – died 1948 of enteritis) and Susan Elizabeth Macintyre Cantey (born 1950). Of her research during this time, Wright wrote "... good as her research was there would have been more of it had she not had a family to look after."{{cite web|last=O'Connor|first=JJ|title=Sheila Scott Macintyre|url=http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Biographies/Macintyre.html|accessdate=3 December 2013}} In 1956 she and Edith Witte published the book German-English Mathematical Vocabulary.{{cite book |last1= Macintyre|first1= Sheila|last2= Witte|first2= Edith|date= 1956|title= German-English Mathematical Vocabulary|location= Edinburgh, U.K.|publisher= Oliver & Boyd|isbn= 978-0050013328 |series = University Mathematical Texts }}
In 1958, the family emigrated to Cincinnati, United States, where Macintyre accepted a visiting professorship at the University of Cincinnati. Also in 1958, she was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Sheila Scott Macintyre died in 1960 in Cincinnati from breast cancer.
Mary Cartwright writes in her obituary "She is remembered as an exceptionally clear lecturer, and an excellent teacher with a warm-hearted but realistic interest in each of her students and also as a charming and helpful and often amusing colleague."{{cite journal|last=Cartwright|first=Mary|title=Sheila Scott Macintyre|journal=Journal of the London Mathematical Society|pages=254–256|year=1961|doi=10.1112/jlms/s1-36.1.254 }}
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- {{MathGenealogy |id=18578}}
- [http://www.agnesscott.edu/lriddle/women/macintyr.htm "Sheila Scott Macintyre", Biographies of Women Mathematicians], Agnes Scott College
- {{MacTutor Biography|id=Macintyre}}
{{PlanetMath attribution|id=9630|title=Sheila Scott Macintyre}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Macintyre, Sheila Scott}}
Category:20th-century Scottish mathematicians
Category:Alumni of Girton College, Cambridge
Category:Scottish emigrants to the United States
Category:University of Cincinnati faculty
Category:Alumni of the University of Edinburgh
Category:People educated at the Mary Erskine School
Category:Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
Category:Academics of the University of Aberdeen
Category:20th-century Scottish women scientists
Category:Deaths from breast cancer in Ohio
Category:Scientists from Edinburgh
Category:20th-century British women mathematicians