Person: Radon, Johann

Johann Radon worked on the calculus of variations, differential geometry and measure theory.

Johann then attended secondary school in Leitmeritz (now Litomerice) in Bohemia between 1897 and 1905.
In 1919 Radon became an extraordinary professor at Hamburg shortly after being promoted to an extraordinary professorship in Vienna in an attempt to keep him there.
The University of Hamburg was a new university, opening in May 1919 shortly before Radon was appointed on the recommendation of Blaschke.
Radon had an enjoyable social life in Greifswald; he enjoyed sailing and playing the lute.
In 1928 Radon moved again, this time to the University of Breslau where he succeeded Adolf Kneser on his retirement.
After happy times in Greifswald and Erlangen, fate was cruel to Radon in Breslau.
Radon himself became ill and underwent surgery in 1939; he was recovering in hospital when informed of Hermann's death.
Radon joined them at Wechselburg where there were no books, lecture notes, or resources of any kind.
Radon gave a course on complex analysis completely from memory having no materials available to help him.
Radon applied the calculus of variations to differential geometry which led to applications in number theory.
It was while he was studying applications of the calculus of variations to differential geometry that he discovered curves which are now named Radon curves.
Radon had a long association with the Austrian Academy of Sciences.

Born 16 December 1887, Tetschen, Bohemia (now Decin, Czech Republic). Died 25 May 1956, Vienna, Austria.

View full biography at MacTutor

Origin Czech Republic

Thank you to the contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0!

O’Connor, John J; Robertson, Edmund F: MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive