Hermann Minkowski

He got married to Auguste Adler in 1897. They had two daughters namely Lily and Ruth.

He died unexpectedly of appendicitis at the age of 44 in Gottingen. To honour his contribution, the asteroid ‘12493 Minkowski’ and ‘M-matrices’ are named after him.

After his death, renowned physicists like Max von Laue and Arnold Sommerfeld extended his idea of space and time. In 1911, Lau published a textbook on the special theory of relativity and it was the first textbook that used the formulation of Minowski.

Hermann Minkowski was born in Aleksotas, Kingdom of Poland, as the son of Polish Jews parents Rachel and Lewin Minkowski. His father was a businessman.

He received his early education at home till the age of seven.

His parents shifted to Germany and settled in Konigsberg in 1872. He converted himself to Protestantism for educational purpose.

He received his school education at the Altstadtisches Gymnasium in Konigsberg.

In April 1880, he took admission at the University of Konigsberg.

In 1887, he joined the University of Bonn as a non-salaried lecturer. At that time, he submitted a paper namely “Spatial visualization and minima of positive definite quadratic forms” at the University.

Gradually, he became the assistant professor at the University of Bonn in 1892. During this time, he worked on the motion of solids immersed in perfect liquid which was a part of mathematical physics.

After two years, he returned to Konigsberg University where he taught for two years. After that, the Eidgenossische Polytechnikum Zurich appointed him for a teaching position.

At Zurich he interacted with the students of engineering and mathematics. Here, he delivered lectures on a number of topics like potential theory, hydrodynamics, theory of functions and so on.

In 1902, he accepted a chair at the University of Gottingen. He served in this position till his death. At that time, he became interested towards the study of mathematical physics.

In 1896, he propounded his theory on geometry of numbers. This theory is applicable in functional analysis and Diophantine approximation. Through geometrical theory, he solved problems in number theory.