Waclaw Sierpinski

Sierpiński, Wacław 

Born Mar. 14, 1882, in Warsaw; died there Oct. 21, 1969. Polish mathematician.

Sierpiński graduated from Warsaw University in 1904 and was a professor there from 1918 to 1960. Between 1917 and 1951 he was a member of the Academy of Learning in Kraków. In 1952 he became a member of the Polish Academy of Sciences, which was established in Warsaw to replace the Kraków Academy of Learning and the Warsaw Scientific Society. He was vice-president of the Polish Academy of Sciences from 1952 to 1957.

Sierpinski’s principal works deal with the theory of functions of a real variable, with set theory, and with the applications of set theory to topology. Together with the Polish mathematicians Z. Janiszewski and S. Mazurkiewicz he founded in 1920 the journal Fundamenta mathematicae, which is devoted to set theory and its applications.

WORKS

Teoría liczb, 3rd ed. Warsaw, 1950.
Leçons sur les nombres transfinis, new ed. Paris, 1950.
Hypothèse du continu. Warsaw, 1934.
General Topology. Toronto, 1952.
In Russian translation:
O reshenii uravnenii v tselykh chislakh. Moscow, 1961.
Sto prostykh, no odnovremenno i trudnykh voprosov arifmetiki. Moscow, 1961.
Chto my znaem i chego ne znaem o prostykh chislakh. Moscow-Leningrad, 1963.
O teorii mnozhestv. Moscow, 1966.
250 zadach po elementarnoi teorii chisel. Moscow, 1968. (Introductory article is devoted to Sierpiñski.)

REFERENCE

Jubileusz 40-lecla działalności na katedrze uniwersyteckiej profesora Wasława Sierpińskiego, Warszawa, 23/9.1948. Warsaw, 1949. (Contains bibliography.)