Joseph Ludwig Raabe

Joseph Ludwig Raabe

Joseph Ludwig Raabe (born May 15, 1801 in Brody ; † January 22, 1859 in Zurich ) was a Swiss mathematician .

Raabe's parents were very poor. Therefore, he had to earn a living early on by giving private lessons. In 1820 he began studying mathematics at the Polytechnic in Vienna . In 1827 he converted to Catholicism. In the autumn of 1831 he moved to Zurich. There he completed his habilitation in 1833 and then became a high school teacher and private lecturer at the university. In 1836 he received the citizenship of Schwamendingen-Oerlikon (today the municipality of Zurich). In 1855 he received a chair at the newly founded federal polytechnic .

Raabe became known for the Raabe criterion named after him , which is used to check the convergence or divergence of infinite series . The so-called Raabe's integral of the gamma function is also named after him

${\displaystyle \int \limits _{a}^{a+1}\log \Gamma (t)\,\mathrm {d} t={\tfrac {1}{2}}\log 2\pi +a\log a-a,\quad a\geq 0,}$

named.

He also published a three-volume work on differential and integral calculus (Zurich 1839–47) and, in 1857–58, two books on Mathematical Communications .

literature

• Constantin von Wurzbach : Raabe, Joseph Ludwig . In: Biographisches Lexikon des Kaiserthums Oesterreich . 24th part. Imperial-Royal Court and State Printing Office, Vienna 1872, p. 160 f. ( Digitized version ).
• Moritz Cantor :  Raabe, Josef Ludwig . In: Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (ADB). Volume 27, Duncker & Humblot, Leipzig 1888, p. 66.
• Auguste Dick :  Raabe Josef Ludwig. In: Austrian Biographical Lexicon 1815–1950 (ÖBL). Volume 8, Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna 1983, ISBN 3-7001-0187-2 , p. 357 f. (Direct links on p. 357 , p. 358 ).
• Erwin Neuenschwander : Raabe, Joseph Ludwig. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .

Web links

• Overview of the courses held by Joseph Ludwig Raabe at the University of Zurich (summer semester 1833 to summer semester 1858)