September 14, 2014
<Back to Index>
This page is sponsored by:
PAGE SPONSOR
 

Alberto Pedro Calderón (September 14, 1920 – April 16, 1998) was an Argentine mathematician best known for his work on the theory of partial differential equations and singular integral operators, and widely considered as one of the 20th century's most important mathematicians. He was born in Mendoza, and died in Chicago.

Calderón graduated in civil engineering from the University of Buenos Aires in 1947 and earned a Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Chicago in 1950.

In 1958 Calderón published one of his most important results, on uniqueness of solution of the Cauchy problem for partial differential equations. With his Ph.D. supervisor and mentor Antoni Zygmund he formulated the Calderón – Zygmund lemma of singular integral operators. At MIT, he supervised the dissertations of Irwin S. Bernstein, among others.

During his career he held academic posts at Ohio State University, the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Chicago, from which he retired in 1985. He was awarded many prizes for his work including the Bôcher Memorial Prize in 1975, the Wolf Prize in 1989, and the National Medal of Science in 1991. Calderón has an Erdős number of 3.

The Calderón prize of the Inverse Problems International Association is named in his honor.