Julius Wolff (mathematician)
Julius Wolff (18 April 1882 – 8 February 1945) was a Dutch-Jewish mathematician, known for the Denjoy–Wolff theorem and for his boundary version of the Schwarz lemma. With his family he was arrested in Utrecht by the Nazi occupation forces of the Netherlands on 8 March 1943 and transported to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp on 13 September 1944, where he died of epidemic typhus on 8 February 1945, shortly before the camp was liberated.
Julius Wolff | |
|---|---|
Julius Wolff 1882 - 1945 | |
| Born | 18 April 1882 Nijmegen, Netherlands |
| Died | 8 February 1945 (aged 62) Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, Nazi Germany |
| Alma mater | Universiteit van Amsterdam |
| Known for | Denjoy–Wolff theorem, boundary version of the Schwarz lemma |
| Spouse | Betsy Gersons (Tilburg 12 June 1889 – Bergen-Belsen 9 March 1945) |
| Children | Louis (died 11 May 1940 in Amsterdam), Ernst (Groningen 9 October 1919 – Bergen-Belsen 3 March 1945) |
| Scientific career | |
| Thesis | Dynamen, beschouwd als duale vectoren (1908) |
| Doctoral advisor | Diederik Johannes Korteweg |
Wolff studied mathematics and physics at the University of Amsterdam, where he earned his doctorate in 1908 under Korteweg with thesis Dynamen, beschouwd als duale vectoren. From 1907 to 1917 he taught at secondary and grammar schools in Meppel, Middelburg, and Amsterdam. In 1917 Wolff was appointed Professor of differential calculus, theory of functions and higher algebra at the University of Groningen and in 1922 at the University of Utrecht. He was also a statistical advisor for the life insurance company (or co-operative distributive society) "Eigen Hulp," (a predecessor of AEGON) with offices at The Hague.