Gaetano Fichera

Gaetano Fichera ( born February 8, 1922 in Acireale, † June 1, 1996 in Rome ) was an Italian mathematician who worked on Analysis.

Life

Fichera was the son of a maths lecturer ( Giuseppe Fichera ). He studied from 1937 to 1939 at the University of Catania and then at the University of Rome, where he Mauro Picone at the Laurea magna cum laude, earned in 1941. In 1943 he was in the army, was captured by German troops at the capitulation of Italy, but escaped and joined the partisans. In 1948 he qualified as a professor and in 1949 after a competition Professor of Analysis at the University of Trieste. In 1956 he went to Rome as the successor of his teacher Mauro Picone. Later he was in Rome at the Istituto Nazionale di Alta Matematica. In 1992, he was officially retired, but remained mathematically active.

He dealt with Analysis ( calculus of variations, functional analysis, approximation theory, partial differential equations, potential theory, measure and integration theory, theory of functions of one and several variables, Numerical Analysis, differential forms ) and their applications, for example in the theory of elasticity ( he wrote in 1972 two articles on mathematical theory of elasticity in edited by Siegfried Flügge Springer Handbook of Physics). In 1963, he led (as a solution to the problem of Antonio Signorini in the theory of elasticity ) variation inequalities which were soon developed by Guido Stampacchia.

He also dealt with the history of mathematics, especially in 19th century Italy. His wife wrote a biography, which she published in 2006 in Rome, self-published.

He was a member of the Accademia dei Lincei, the Accademia dei XL, the Russian Academy of Sciences, and since 1973 the Leopoldina. In 1976 he received the Feltrinelli Prize. In 1970 he was invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Nice ( Unilateral constraints in elasticity ).

Writings

  • Opere scelte, 3 volumes, Edizioni Cremonese 2004 ( Selected Works )
  • Linear elliptic differential systems and eigenvalue problems, Springer 1965
  • With Mauro Picone Trattato di matematica analisi, Rome 1954
  • Numerical and quantitative analysis, Pitman 1978
  • Boundary value problems of elasticity with unilateral constraints, and Existence theorems in elasticity, in Siegfried Flügge, Clifford Truesdell (Editor) Encyclopedia of Physics / Encyclopedia of Physics, Volume VIa / 2, Solid Mechanics II / Mechanics of Solids II, Springer Verlag 1972
  • Vito Volterra and the birth of functional analysis, in Jean -Paul Pier Development of mathematics 1900-1950, Birkhäuser 1994
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