Kustaa Aadolf Inkeri

Kustaa Aadolf Inkeri (born November 12, 1908 in Laitila , † March 16, 1997 in Turku ) was a Finnish mathematician and astronomer.

Inkeri was one of five children of a farmer. He attended school in Turku until 1928 and then attended the university there, where he financed his studies in mathematics, physics and astronomy through private lessons (graduated in 1936). While still a student, he married Fanny Ragnhild Vänni, with whom he had a total of five children. After a short time at the University Observatory in Turku, he worked as a teacher. During the Finnish-Russian war from 1939 onwards he led a company at the front and was then a staff officer, organizing mathematics lessons for his comrades in the quieter phases of the war.

After the war he continued to work as a teacher, but at the same time received his doctorate in 1946 with the dissertation "Investigations on the Fermat Hypothesis" at the University of Turku near Kalle Väisälä , became an assistant at the university in 1947 and a professor in 1950. In this position he built up the mathematical institute in Turku and was de facto (he avoided taking on too many administrative tasks) its director until his retirement in 1972.

The main field of work of Inkeri was (algebraic) number theory , especially Fermat's last theorem , the Catalan conjecture , primality tests , Diophantine approximations , class numbers of circles. He was the founder of a school of algebraic number theory in Finland. He has also discovered some asteroids .

In 1951 he became a member of the Finnish Academy of Sciences .

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personal data
SURNAME	Inkeri, Kustaa Aadolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Finnish mathematician and astronomer
DATE OF BIRTH	November 12, 1908
PLACE OF BIRTH	Laitila
DATE OF DEATH	March 16, 1997
Place of death	Turku