Dmitry Mirimanoff

Dmitry Semionovitch Mirimanoff (Russian: Дми́трий Семёнович Мирима́нов) (September 13, 1861, Pereslavl-Zalessky, Russia – January 5, 1945, Geneva, Switzerland) became a doctor of mathematical sciences in 1900, in Geneva, and taught at the universities of Geneva and Lausanne. Mirimanoff made notable contributions to axiomatic set theory and to number theory (relating specifically to Fermat's last theorem, on which he corresponded with Albert Einstein before the First World War^[1]). In 1917, he introduced, though not as explicitly as John von Neumann later, the cumulative hierarchy of sets and the notion of von Neumann ordinals.

Dmitry Mirimanoff became a member of the Moscow Mathematical Society in 1897.^[2]

Life

Dmitry Semionovitch Mirimanoff (Russian: Дми́трий Семёнович Мирима́нов) was born in Pereslavl-Zalessky, Russia, on 13 September 1861. His parents were Semion Mirimanovitch Mirimanoff (Russian: Семён Мирима́нович Мирима́нов) and Maria Dmitrievna Rudakova (Russian: Мари́я Дми́триевна Рудакова). His was a great great son of Davyd A. (?) Mirimanian (later Mirimanoff) (Russian: Дави́д А. (?) Мириманян), a member of an old Armenian family settled in Georgia and an honourary citizen of Tiflis (now Tbilisi).

Around 1885, Dmitry Mirimanoff met a French lady Malvina Geneviève Valentine Adriansen in Nice. Geneviève Adriansen learnt Russian and accepted Russian Orthodox Christianity. They married in Geneva on 25 October 1897 and had two sons: Alexander (later Alexandre) Dmitrievitch Mirimanoff (Russian: Алекса́ндр Дми́триевич Мирима́нов), born in Oranienbaum (now Lomonossov) in 1898, and Andreï (later André) Dmitrievitch Mirimanoff (Russian: Андрей Дми́триевич Мирима́нов), born in Geneva in 1902.

The family lived in Russia (first, in Moscow, then in St Petersburg) until 1900 when they moved to Geneva (in search of a better climate for Dmitry Mirimanoff's bad health). After the 1917 revolutions they never visited Russia, although Dmitry's sisters Sophia and Lydia remained there. Dmitry Mirimanoff became a Swiss citizen on 17 September 1926. Dmitry Mirimanoff died on 5 January 1945 in Geneva.

Work

Fermat's last theorem

Reflection method

In 2008, Marc Renault published an article^[3] in which he pointed out that it is Dmitry Mirimanoff who should be credited for creating "the reflection method" for solving Bertrand's ballot problem, not Désiré André to whom it had been long credited. Therefore, Donald Knuth, who has read Renault's article, will credit Mirimanoff instead of André in future printings of Volume 1 of his monograph The Art of Computer Programming.^[4]

See also

• Mirimanoff's congruence
• Wieferich prime

References

1. ^ Jean A. Mirimanoff. Private correspondence with Anton Lokhmotov. (2009)
2. ^ "Состав Математического Общества". Математический Сборник 31 (1): 1–3. 1922. http://mi.mathnet.ru/msb6920. 
3. ^ Renault, Marc (April 2008). "Lost (and Found) in Translation: André's Actual Method and Its Application to the Generalized Ballot Problem". American Mathematical Monthly 115 (4): 358–362. http://webspace.ship.edu/msrenault/ballotproblem/monthly358-363-renault.pdf. 
4. ^ Donald E. Knuth. Private correspondence with Anton Lokhmotov. (2009)

External links

• Brief biography

• Brief biography

• Vandiver, H.S. (1942–1950). "Les travaux mathématiques de Dmitry Mirimanoff". L’Enseignement Mathématique 39: 169–179. http://retro.seals.ch/digbib/fr/view?lp=169&rid=ensmat-001%3A1942-1950%3A39%3A%3A381&Submit=ok&lp=.  Includes a list of 60 Mirimanoff's papers.

• Mirimanoff, D. (1923). "A propos de l’interprétation géométrique du problème du scrutin". L’Enseignement Mathématique 23: 187–189. http://webspace.ship.edu/msrenault/ballotproblem/French%20Mirimanoff.pdf.  Describes the reflection method for solving Bertrand's ballot problem.

• Tzermias, Pavlos (2007). "On Cauchy–Liouville–Mirimanoff Polynomials". Canadian Mathematical Bulletin 50 (2): 313–320. http://journals.cms.math.ca/cgi-bin/vault/view/tzermias8507. 

Persondata
Name	Mirimanoff, Dimitry
Alternative names	Mirimanoff, Dimitry
Short description	Russian-Swiss mathematician
Date of birth	September 13, 1861
Place of birth	Pereslavl-Zalessky, Russia
Date of death	January 5, 1945
Place of death	Geneva, Switzerland