Mordell

Louis Joel Mordell

Born: 28 Jan 1888 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
Died: 12 March 1972 in Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England

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Louis Mordell was educated at Cambridge and began research in number theory. He studied solutions of y^2 = x^3 + k which had been studied by Fermat. Thue showed that this equation had only finitely many solutions but Mordell only learned about Thue's work later.

Mordell lectured at Manchester College of Technology from 1920 to 1922. During this time he discovered the result for which he is best known, namely the finite basis theorem, which proved a conjecture of Poincaré. In 1922 he went to Manchester University where he remained until he succeeded Hardy at Cambridge in 1945. Together with Davenport, he initiated great advances in the geometry of numbers.

References:

  1. Dictionary of Scientific Biography
  2. J W S Cassels, J L Mordell, Bull. London Math. Soc. 6 (1974), 69-96.
  3. J W S Cassels, J L Mordell, Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society of London 19 (1973), 493-520. 
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