Alan BakerBorn 19 Aug 1939.British mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal in 1970. Awarded every four years for outstanding discoveries in mathematics, the Medal is considered the highest honor in the field and the equivalent of the Nobel Prize. This award was for his work in Transcendental Number Theory. From ancient Greek times, people tried to 'square a circle' (create a square with the same area as a circle using a ruler and compasses only), but it proved impossible last century by showing that pi is a transcendental number (a number which is not a solution of a polynomial equation with integer coefficients). Baker's work here was a breakthrough with diophantine equations. Baker also made substantial contributions to Hilbert's seventh problem. |
