Walter Rudin

Walter Rudin (born 1921) is an American mathematician, currently a Professor Emeritus of Mathematics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

He is known for three of his books on mathematical analysis: "Functional Analysis", "Principles of Mathematical Analysis", and "Real and Complex Analysis." The second and third books are affectionately called "Baby Rudin" and "Big Rudin" (or sometimes "Papa Rudin") by math students.

Rudin was born into a Jewish family in Austria in 1921. They fled to France after the Anschluss in 1938. When France surrendered to Germany in 1940, Rudin fled to England and served in the British navy for the rest of the war. After the war he left for the United States, and earned his Ph.D. from Duke University in North Carolina in 1949. After that he was a C.L.E. Moore Instructor at MIT before becoming a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

In 1953, he married fellow mathematician Mary Ellen Estill. The two now reside in Madison, Wisconsin, in a home built by architect Frank Lloyd Wright.

Major awards

* Steele Prize for Mathematical Exposition (1993)

Books

* "Principles of Mathematical Analysis"
* "Real and Complex Analysis"
* "Functional Analysis"
* "Fourier Analysis on Groups"
* "Function Theory in Polydiscs"
* "Function Theory in the Unit Ball of" C^"n"
* "The Way I Remember It" (autobiography)

External links

* [http://www.math.wisc.edu/directories/alumni/RudinW.htm Professor Rudin's former Ph.D students]
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* [http://www.peterbeers.net/interests/flw_rt/Wisconsin/Rudin/Rudin.htm Photos of Rudin Residence]