Willem Abraham Wythoff
Born
Willem Abraham Wijthoff

(1865-10-06)6 October 1865
Amsterdam
Died21 May 1939(1939-05-21) (aged 73)
Amsterdam
NationalityDutch
Alma materUniversity of Amsterdam
Known forWythoff's game, Wythoff construction, Wythoff symbol
Scientific career
FieldsMathematics
Doctoral advisorDiederik Korteweg

Willem Abraham Wythoff, born Wijthoff (Dutch pronunciation: [ʋɛithɔf]), (6 October 1865 – 21 May 1939) was a Dutch mathematician.

Biography

Wythoff was born in Amsterdam to Anna C. F. Kerkhoven and Abraham Willem Wijthoff,[1] who worked in a sugar refinery.[2] He studied at the University of Amsterdam, and earned his Ph.D. in 1898 under the supervision of Diederik Korteweg.[3]

Contributions

Wythoff is known in combinatorial game theory and number theory for his study of Wythoff's game, whose solution involves the Fibonacci numbers.[2] The Wythoff array, a two-dimensional array of numbers related to this game and to the Fibonacci sequence, is also named after him.[4][5]

In geometry, Wythoff is known for the Wythoff construction of uniform tilings and uniform polyhedra and for the Wythoff symbol used as a notation for these geometric objects.

Selected publications

  • Wythoff, W. A. (1905–1907), "A modification of the game of nim", Nieuw Archief voor Wiskunde, 2: 199–202.
  • Wythoff, W. A. (1918), "A relation between the polytopes of the C600-family", Proceedings of the Section of Sciences, Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen te Amsterdam, 20: 966–970, Bibcode:1918KNAB...20..966W.

References

  1. ↑ "Gezinsblad van Willem Abraham Wijthoff". www.humanitarisme.nl. Retrieved Oct 12, 2022.
  2. 1 2 Stakhov, Alexey; Stakhov, Alekseĭ Petrovich; Olsen, Scott Anthony (2009), The Mathematics of Harmony: From Euclid to Contemporary Mathematics and Computer Science, K & E Series on Knots and Everything, vol. 22, World Scientific, pp. 129–130, ISBN 9789812775825.
  3. ↑ Willem Abraham Wythoff at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
  4. ↑ Kimberling, Clark (1995), "The Zeckendorf array equals the Wythoff array" (PDF), Fibonacci Quarterly, 33 (1): 3–8.
  5. ↑ Morrison, D. R. (1980), "A Stolarsky array of Wythoff pairs", A Collection of Manuscripts Related to the Fibonacci Sequence (PDF), Santa Clara, Calif: The Fibonacci Association, pp. 134–136.

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