December 22: National Mathematics Day

The National Mathematics Day is observed every year on 22nd December to celebrate birth anniversary of great Indian autodidact Mathematician Srinivasa Ramanujan. This year, it is 129th birth anniversary of Srinivasa Ramanujan.

About Srinivasa Ramanujan

• Srinivasa Ramanujan was born on 22nd December, 1887 in Erode district of Tamil Nadu. He died at young age of 32 on 26 April 1920.
• He was considered as doyen of number theory, infinite series, mathematical analysis, and making formulas and equations without any formal training in pure mathematics.He in the same league as great mathematicians such as Euler and Gauss.
• He was deeply religious person and had credited his mathematical capacities to divinity. He had once said ‘”An equation for me has no meaning, unless it expresses a thought of God.”
• Key contributions: As a mathematical genius, he had compiled more than 3900 mathematical results and equations.
• His Ramanujan Prime and Ramanujan theta discoveries have inspired further research on this mathematical subject.
• Along with British Mathematician Godfrey Harold Hardy, Ramanujan had discovered the smallest number represented as sum of two cubes 1729 which is known as Hardy-Ramanujan number.
• Autobiography and Movie: The feature film “The Man Who Knew Infinity” was based on his life. It was based on his biography “The Man Who Knew Infinity: A Life of the Genius Ramanujan” written in 1991 by Robert Kanigel.

Background

The National Mathematics Day was instituted in 2011 by the Union Government to celebrate Ramanujan’s 125th birth anniversary. Besides, the year 2012 was also declared National Mathematics Year.

Month: Current Affairs - December, 2016