Leonard Carlitz was an American mathematician

Mathematician

A mathematician is a person whose primary area of study is the field of mathematics. Mathematicians are concerned with quantity, structure, space, and change....

. Carlitz supervised 44 Doctorates at Duke University

Duke University

Duke University is a private research university located in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present day town of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco industrialist James B...

 and published over 770 papers.

Chronology

• 1907 Born Philadelphia, PA, USA
• 1927 BA, University of Pennsylvania
  University of Pennsylvania
  The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
  
  
• 1930 PhD, University of Pennsylvania, 1930 under Howard Mitchell, who had studied under Oswald Veblen
  Oswald Veblen
  Oswald Veblen was an American mathematician, geometer and topologist, whose work found application in atomic physics and the theory of relativity. He proved the Jordan curve theorem in 1905.-Life:...
  
   at Princeton
  Princeton University
  Princeton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
  
  
• 1930/31 at Caltech with E.T. Bell
• 1931 married Clara Skaler
• 1931/32 at Cambridge with G.H. Hardy
• 1932 Joined the faculty of Duke University where he served for 45 years
• 1938 to 1973 Editorial Board Duke Mathematics Journal
  Duke Mathematical Journal
  Duke Mathematical Journal is a peer-reviewed mathematics journal published by Duke University Press. It was established in 1935. The founding editors-in-chief were David Widder, Arthur Coble, and Joseph Miller Thomas. The first issue included a paper by Solomon Lefschetz...
  
   (Managing Editor from 1945.)
• 1939 Birth of son Michael
• 1940 Supervision of his first doctoral student E.F. Canaday, awarded 1940
• 1945 Birth of son Robert
• 1964 First James B. Duke Professor
  James B. Duke Professor
  At Duke University, the title of James B. Duke Professor is given to a small number of the faculty with extraordinary records of achievement. At some universities, titles like "Distinguished Professor," "Institute Professor," or "Regents Professor" are counterparts of this title.- Some current...
  
   in Mathematics
• 1977 Supervised his 44th and last doctoral student, Jo Ann Lutz, awarded 1977
• 1977 Retired
• 1990 Death of wife Clara, after 59 years of marriage
• 1999 September 17 Died in Pittsburgh, PA

Mathematical work

The Carlitz Module is generalized by the Drinfel'd Module

Drinfel'd module

In mathematics, a Drinfel'd module is roughly a special kind of module over a ring of functions on a curve over a finite field, generalizing the Carlitz module. Loosely speaking, they provide a function field analogue of complex multiplication theory...

An Identity regarding Bernoulli Numbers

Bernoulli number

In mathematics, the Bernoulli numbers Bn are a sequence of rational numbers with deep connections to number theory. They are closely related to the values of the Riemann zeta function at negative integers....

Carlitz wrote about Bessel Polynomials

Bessel polynomials

In mathematics, the Bessel polynomials are an orthogonal sequence of polynomials. There are a number of different but closely related definitions...

He introduced Al-Salam–Carlitz polynomials

Al-Salam–Carlitz polynomials

In mathematics, Al-Salam–Carlitz polynomials U and V are two families of basic hypergeometric orthogonal polynomials in the basic Askey scheme, introduced by...

.

Carlitz' identity for bicentric quadrilaterals

Publication

Leonard Carlitz published about 771 technical papers comprising approximately 7000 pages. The effort to edit his collected works, undertaken originally by Professor John Brillhart, is ongoing.

External links

• Obituary at Duke's Math Newsletter