Johann Christian Martin Bartels

Johann Christian Martin Bartels ( born August 12, 1769 in Braunschweig, † 7.jul / December 19 1836greg in Dorpat. . ) Was a German mathematician.

Life and work

The son of pewterer Heinrich Elias Friedrich Bartels and his wife Johanna Christine Margarethe Köhler was already in his childhood keen interest in mathematics. In 1783 he became an assistant to the teacher Büttner at the Brunswick and numeracy school. Here he met the talented Carl Friedrich Gauss know whose talent he supported and for which he uttered a recommendation at the Regent. Between these personalities is a friendly relationship developed. An exchange of letters between them existed from 1799 to 1823.

Since 23 August 1788, he attended the Collegium Carolinum in Brunswick.

Bartels took in Helmstedt on 23 October 1791, the study of mathematics under Johann Friedrich Pfaff, and continued it in Göttingen with Abraham Gotthelf Kästner. At Georg Christoph Lichtenberg he heard in the winter semester 1793/1794 experimental physics, astronomy, meteorology and Theory of the Earth.

From 1800 he worked in Switzerland as a professor of mathematics in Reichenau (Canton Graubünden). In 1802 he married Anna Magdalena Saluz from Chur. In 1803 he received his doctorate in philosophy in Jena.

In 1807 he was appointed by the founder of the University of Kazan, Stepan Yakovlevich Rumowski ( 1734-1812 ), whom he succeeded in 1808. In Kazan, he held a professorship chair of mathematics. At university he was also in contact with Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky.

In 1821 he moved to the University of Dorpat, where he established a center for differential geometry, which he oversaw until his death. For 1823 he was appointed State Council. He was a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg since 1826 and was awarded the Russian Order high.