Mathematician Research
Mathematician’s Name:
Sir Issac Newton
Biographical information:
Issac Newton was born in England, on the 4th of January, 1642, to farmers. Issac never knew his father as he died early in his life. Issac’s mother remarried and had 3 more children (two girls and a boy). Issac was sent to Cambridge University, in 1661 to become a preacher. While at Cambridge, Newton studies mathematics, however Newton was forced to leave Cambridge, in 1665 after it was shut down due to the plague. Issac returned to University in 1667, after spending two years self-reflecting stating that it was “the prime of my age for invention”.
Sir Issac Newton was elected a Fellow of Trinity College in 1667 and Lucasian Professor of Mathematics in 1669. He remained at the University, lecturing until 1692.
In 1675 Issac Newton suffered mental breakdown due to depression and seemingly battled with this mental health problem for the rest of his life stating that he did not sleep a wink in 5 nights in 1692. Issac Newton never married, and died in 1727. Newton was knighted by Queen Anne in Cambridge on April 16, 1705. This earned him the title 'Sir'.
Mathematical (and other) contributions:
Sir Issac Newton is most famous for the three laws of motion (inertia, force, reciprocal action), He was the first person to conclude that the same laws of gravity that applied to Earth is the same force that keeps planets in motion. This would become known as the law of universal gravitation. Issac Newton also defined the laws of cooling. Issac Newton published his findings in 1687, in a book called ‘Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica’ (Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy).
Issac Newton is also famous for his works in optics as he explained diffraction and observed that white light is a mixture of all the rainbow's colours. Noting that white light could be separated by a prism, producing oval shaped lights rather than circular as the then current theory of light stated. Issac designed the first reflecting telescope and microscope, and the sextant.
Sir Issac Newton is called the father of calculus having discovered it years before Leibniz, however failing to publish it. Issac applied calculus for several purposes finding areas, tangents, the lengths of curves and the maxima and minima of functions. Isaac thought of the fundamental concepts of calculus as considered variables changing over time.
Sir Issac Newton mathematical contributions also include the Binomial Theorem, the idea of polar coordinates, and power series for exponential and trigonometric functions. He also contributed to algebra as stated above the Binomial Theorem describes the algebraic expansion of powers of a binomial (an algebraic expression with two terms, such as a2 - b2). Another way Issac Newton expanded the field of algebra was to the theory of finite differences (mathematical expressions of the form f(x + b) - f(x + a)). He was one of the first to use fractional exponents and coordinate geometry to derive solutions to Diophantine equations (algebraic equations with integer-only variables). Issac also developed the so-called “Newton's method” for finding successively better approximations to the zeroes or roots of a function.
Why you selected this mathematician:
I selected Sir Issac Newton because he is very famous. His laws of gravity are world renown. Albert Einstein had kept a picture of him on his desk. The concept of Issac sitting underneath the apple tree and ‘discovering gravity’ is easily pictured. “Whatever goes up must come down”. I remember studying him in science during high school, and wanted to know how this science was also a mathematician.