Person: Sergescu, Petre
Petre Sergescu was a Romanian mathematician important in the development of sciences in Romania.
Mathematical Profile (Excerpt):
- We note that he is also known as Pierre Sergescu.
- Petre attended primary and secondary schools in Turnu-Severin.
- At this school, Sergescu showed himself to be a talented pupil with particular skills in mathematics, philosophy and music.
- In 1912 he won one of the competitions run by the Gazeta Matematica and this led to Gheorghe Țițeica realising that Sergescu was a young man with great potential in mathematics.
- Petre Sergescu began his studies in the Mathematics section of the University of Bucharest in 1912.
- However, Sergescu had interests outside mathematics and he kept these active by attending, in the same period, courses in the Faculty of Philosophy and in the Conservatory of Music of Bucharest.
- Sergescu enlisted as a cadet in the engineering corps.
- In early 1917 Sergescu was taken prisoner by the Germans and, after being held in a number of different camps, was sent to a prisoner-of-war camp at Plovdiv in Bulgaria where he was held for 18 months.
- Sergescu was awarded a fellowship to study in Paris and, in 1919, he left Romania and travelled to France.
- She met Sergescu after he arrived in Paris to study for his doctorate.
- In 1923 Traian Lalescu asked Sergescu to return to Romania and to submit this doctoral thesis to the University of Bucharest.
- On 28 November 1923 Petre Seregescu's 47-page doctoral thesis Sur les noyaux symétrisables Ⓣ(On symmetrizable cores) was examined at the University of Bucharest by a committee consisting of Gheorghe Țițeica, Traian Lalescu and David Emmanuel.
- Following the award of his doctorate, Sergescu started his teaching career in 1924, as assistant professor at the University of Bucharest and he also taught at the Polytechnic School.
- Sergescu was one of the founders of the journal Mathematica (Cluj) modelled on the Polish journal Fundamenta Mathematicae.
- The journal began publication in 1929 and Sergescu was secretary of the editorial staff until 1948.
- The first was held in Cluj in May 1929 with David Emmanuel as honorary president and the organising committee being Gheorghe Țițeica, Dimitrie Pompeiu, Dumitru Ionescu with Sergescu as the general secretary.
- We should note that Sergescu generously supported these two conferences with large donations of money from his own pocket.
- The Faculty of Sciences was moved to Timisoara, where Sergescu became an active member of the Mathematical Seminar.
- In 1943 Sergescu moved to the Technical University of Bucharest where he served as rector of the university in 1945-46.
- Sergescu published more than 160 scientific papers and took part to numerous international congresses and conferences.
- Sergescu began to publish papers on the topic such as The history of the numerical calculus (Romanian) (1933), Les sciences mathématiques en France Ⓣ(Mathematical sciences in France) (1933) and Histoire des sciences mathématiques et physiques en Roumaine Ⓣ(History of Mathematics and Physical Sciences in Romania) (1934).
- At the Fifth International Congress held at Lausanne in September-October 1947, Sergescu was appointed general secretary of the International Academy of the History of Sciences and of the International Union for the History of Sciences.
- Mieli, who had been the person to persuade Sergescu to undertake research on the history of mathematics, had been the first general secretary but he had retired from the post.
- On the evening of 20 December Sergescu had been reading an obituary of his friend and colleague Dimitrie Pompeiu who had died a couple of months earlier on the 8 October.
- Sergescu was very modest and kind, always eager to be of service to others.
- Anyone who had the privilege of meeting Pierre Sergescu knows what rich qualities of the heart he combined with those of a genuine scientist.
- Sergescu received many honours.
Born 17 December 1893, Turnu-Severin, Oltenia, Austro-Hungarian Empire (now Romania). Died 21 December 1954, Paris, France.
View full biography at MacTutor
Tags relevant for this person:
Origin Romania
Thank you to the contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0! 
- Github:
-
- non-Github:
- @J-J-O'Connor
- @E-F-Robertson
References
Adapted from other CC BY-SA 4.0 Sources:
- O’Connor, John J; Robertson, Edmund F: MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive
