Francis Buekenhout

Francis Buekenhout (born April 23, 1937 in Ixelles / Elsene near Brussels ) is a Belgian mathematician .

life and work

Francis Buekenhout mainly deals with the basics of geometry and there especially with buildings . He studied at the University of Brussels (ULB) with Jacques Tits and Paul Libois, where he received his doctorate on ovals in 1966 . He introduced the term Quadratic Set ( Ensembles quadratiques ), which reproduces the analytical term Projective Quadric with synthetic means, i.e. defined solely by incidence and richness properties.

Together with his teacher Tits, he developed terms for the diagram geometries , which allow the concrete axiom systems of a projective or affine geometry to be largely disregarded and which place these and many other incidence geometries in a common framework. The diagram geometries are also known as Buekenhout-Tits geometries in honor of their inventors .

From 1960 to 1969 he worked at the ULB as an assistant to Libois. From 1969 to 1998 he was an associate professor and from 1977 until his retirement in 2002 he was a full professor. He has been a member of the Académie Royale des Sciences, des Lettres et des Beaux-Arts de Belgique since May 2002 and won the Prix François Deruyts at this academy in 1982 .

Buekenhout co-founded the Belgian Mathematical Olympiad in 1976 and organized it from 1976 to 1987.

Writings by Buekenhout

Etude intrinsèque des ovales . In: Rendiconti di Mat. Volume 25 , 1966, pp. 1-61 (thèse de doctorat).
Ensembles quadratiques des espaces projectifs . In: Math.Zeit. tape 110 , 1969, p. 306-318 .
Francis Buekenhout (Ed.): Handbook of Incidence Geometry . North Holland, 1995, ISBN 978-0-444-88355-1 .

Web links

Buekenhout in the Mathematics Genealogy Project (English)

Individual evidence

↑ Etude intrinsèque des ovales (1966)
^ Ensembles quadratiques des espaces projectifs (1969)
↑ Handbook of Incidence Geometry (1995)
^ Albrecht Beutelspacher , Ute Rosenbaum: Projective geometry . From the basics to the applications. 2nd, revised and expanded edition. Vieweg, Wiesbaden 2004, ISBN 3-528-17241-X .

personal data
SURNAME	Buekenhout, Francis
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Belgian mathematician, (geometry)
DATE OF BIRTH	April 23, 1937
PLACE OF BIRTH	Ixelles / Elsene

[1] Etude intrinsèque des ovales (1966)

[2] Ensembles quadratiques des espaces projectifs (1969)

[3] Handbook of Incidence Geometry (1995)

[4] Albrecht Beutelspacher , Ute Rosenbaum: Projective geometry . From the basics to the applications. 2nd, revised and expanded edition. Vieweg, Wiesbaden 2004, ISBN 3-528-17241-X .