◀ ▲ ▶History / 19th-century / Person: Von Dyck, Walther Franz Anton

Person: Von Dyck, Walther Franz Anton

Von Dyck made important contributions to function theory, group theory (where a fundamental result on group presentations is named after him) topology and potential theory.

Mathematical Profile (Excerpt):

• He was ennobled with the "von" only much later in his life.
• Hermann Dyck was a painter and he was the Director of the Kunstgewerbeschule in Berlin, that is the Berlin School of Industrial Art.
• Dyck went to Leipzig to take up a position as Klein's assistant and there he submitted his habilitation thesis, receiving the university lecturing qualification in 1882.
• During this period Dyck made important contributions to group theory with the publication of two papers; Gruppentheoretische Studien Ⓣ(Group theoretical studies) in Mathematische Annalen the first in 1882 and the second in the following year.
• Klein would remain at Leipzig until 1886, but Dyck left two years before that when he was appointed professor at newly established Munich Polytechnikum.
• Von Dyck stressed how important a basic knowledge in mathematics was to engineers and he worked hard to construct a consistent course to include varied topics.
• Dyck would remain at the Munich Polytechnikum for the rest of his career and gave outstanding service to it in many important ways.
• There was another important project in which von Dyck played an important role.
• The idea was first suggested by Oskar von Miller who was an electrical engineer who was instrumental in setting up the electric power industry in Germany.
• In 1903 Miller enlisted the help of von Dyck and of Carl von Linde who had been appointed extraordinary professor of machine design at the Munich Polytechnikum in the same year as von Dyck was appointed.
• Not only was von Dyck one of the three to establish and develop the museum in its early stages, but he was also appointed as the second Director of the Museum in 1906.
• Von Dyck made important contributions to function theory, group theory (where a fundamental result on group presentations is named after him), topology (where he was influenced by the work of Riemann), and to potential theory.
• Another important project which von Dyck undertook was one to publish the complete works of Kepler, including all Kepler's letters.
• This project has extended well beyond von Dyck's lifetime with Volume 7 appearing in 1953, and Volume 8 in 1963.

Born 6 December 1856, Munich, Germany. Died 5 November 1934, Munich, Germany.

View full biography at MacTutor

Tags relevant for this person:

Algebra, Group Theory, Origin Germany

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

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@J-J-O'Connor

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References

Adapted from other CC BY-SA 4.0 Sources:

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