Walter Saxer

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Walter Saxer

Walter Saxer (born December 2, 1896 in Stein , †  June 25, 1974 in Samaden ) was a Swiss mathematician . After Saxer had attended the canton school in Trogen , he studied at the ETH Zurich . In 1920 he received his diploma as a subject teacher and in 1923 he did his doctorate with George Pólya . He then worked first at the Federal Insurance Office, then as a main teacher at the Aarau Cantonal School. In the academic year 1926/27 he was able to deepen his knowledge thanks to a Rockefeller scholarship to the universities in Paris and Göttingen . From 1927 to 1966 he was a professor of mathematics at the ETH. In the Auditorium Maximum he lectured basic mathematical lectures for all future engineers, mathematicians and physicists. In the post-war years, the Swiss Federal Council appointed him mathematical advisor on social security issues. In this role he played a key role in the creation of the Swiss old-age and survivors' insurance (AHV).

In 1934/35 he was president of the Swiss Mathematical Society and from 1939 the youngest elected rector of the ETH.

Saxer's main area of ​​work was initially function theory . His dissertation, which deals with Picard's exceptional values ​​of the derivatives of whole functions , also contains a presentation of the Wiman-Valiron theory . In further work he examined normal families of meromorphic functions . Later he turned mainly to probability and statistics . His two-volume textbook on actuarial mathematics became a standard work.

Heinz Huber , Albert Pfluger and Heinz Rutishauser are among his students .

literature

  • Hans Bühlmann: In memoriam Prof. Dr. Walter Saxer. In: Elements of Mathematics. Volume 30, Issue 1, 1975, pp. 1-4, doi: 10.5169 / seals-30641

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ About Picard's exceptional values ​​of successive derivatives . Dissertation, Springer, Berlin 1923; published in Mathematische Zeitschrift , Volume 17, Issue 1, 1923, pp. 206-227; on-line
  2. ^ Walter Saxer: actuarial mathematics. 2 volumes, Springer-Verlag, 1955 and 1958
  3. ^ Mathematics Genealogy Project
personal data
SURNAME Saxer, Walter
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss mathematician
DATE OF BIRTH December 2, 1896
PLACE OF BIRTH stone
DATE OF DEATH June 25, 1974
Place of death Samads