Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-t5tsf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-13T10:11:39.349Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

George Green, mathematician and physicist 1793 – 1841

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 August 2016

D.M. Cannell  and
N.J. Lord
D.M. Cannell
Affiliation:
39 Village Road, Clifton, Nottingham NG11 8NP
N.J. Lord
Affiliation:
Tonbridge School, Kent TN9 1JP
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

These past two years have seen the bicentenaries of Michael Faraday, Charles Babbage and John Frederick Herschel. A fourth contemporary, who deserves to rank with these, is George Green, the bicentenary of whose birth will be marked by the dedication of a plaque in Westminster Abbey. His memorial will be in proximity to those commemorating Newton, Kelvin, Faraday and Clerk Maxwell. Those to the Herschels (William and John) and Stokes are close by. Green’s memorial designates him “Mathematician and Physicist”. Most mathematicians will know of Green’s theorem and Green’s functions; physicists find his papers seminal to the study of, for example, solid state physics and elasticity and, since the mid-twentieth century, Green’s functions have become an indispensable technique for those working in nuclear physics.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Mathematical Gazette , Volume 77 , Issue 478 , March 1993 , pp. 26 - 51
Copyright
Copyright © The Mathematical Association 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Ferrers, N.M. (ed.), Mathematical papers of George Green, reprinted by Chelsea (1970).Google Scholar
2. University of Nottingham Libraries, George Green, miller and mathematician 1793–1841, (1988). A catalogue of sources, obtainable for £1 from Nottingham University Library.Google Scholar
3. Cannell, D.M., George Green, mathematician and physicist, 1793–1841: the background to his life and work, Athlone Press (1993).Google Scholar
4. Cannell, D.M., George Green, miller and mathematician 1793–1841, Castle Museum, Nottingham (1988). Obtainable from Green’s Mill, £2.30.Google Scholar
5. Challis, L.J., “George Green – miller, mathematician and physicist”. Math. Spectrum 20 No. 2 (1987/8).Google Scholar
6. Farina, J.E.G., “The work and significance of George Green, the miller mathematician, 1793–1841” Bulletin of the I.M.A 12 (1976) 98–105.Google Scholar
7. Gray, G.J.. “George Green”, Dictionary of national biography, vol. 23, Smith, Elder & co. (1890).Google Scholar
8. Green, H.G., “A biography of George Green”, in Ashley, M.F., (ed.) Studies and essays in the history of science and learning. New York (1947).Google Scholar
9. Phillips, D., (ed.) George Green, Miller, Sneinton, Castle Museum, Nottingham (1976, out of print).Google Scholar
10. Whitrow, G.J., “George Green (1793–1841): a pioneer of modern mathematical physics and its methodology”, Annali dell’lstituto e Museo di Storia delia Scienza di Firenze 9 (1984) 45–68.Google Scholar
11. Archibald, T., “Connectivity and smoke-rings: Green’s second identity in its first fifty years”, Mathematics Magazine 62 (1989) 219–232.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
12. Barton, G., Elements of Green’s functions and propagation: potentials, diffusion and waves, Oxford U.P. (1991).Google Scholar
13. Crowe, M.J., A history of vector analysis, Univ. of Notre Dame Press (1967).Google Scholar
14. Dieudonné, J., History of functional analysis, North-Holland (1981).Google Scholar
15. Drazin, P.G., Solitons, Cambridge U.P. (1983).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
16. Harman, P.M. (ed.), Wranglers and physicists: studies on Cambridge mathematical physics in the nineteenth century, Manchester U.P. (1985).Google Scholar
17. Kellogg, O.D., Foundations of potential theory, Dover (1954).Google Scholar
18. Love, A.E.H., A treatise on the mathematical theory of elasticity (2nd ed), Cambridge U.P.,(1906).Google Scholar
19. Ramsey, A.S., An introduction to the theory of Newtonian attraction, Cambridge U.P. (1982).Google Scholar
21. Schlissel, A., “The development of asymptotic solutions of linear ODEs, 1817–1920”, Arch, for Hist, of Exact Sciences 16 (1977) 307–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
22. Stolze, C.H., “A history of the divergence theorem”, Historia Mathematica 5 (1978) 437–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
23. Strauss, W.A., Partial differential equations – an introduction, Wiley (1992).Google Scholar
24. Temple, G., 100 years of mathematics, Duckworth (1981).Google Scholar
25. Thomson, W. and Tait, P.G., Treatise on natural philosophy. Part I, Part II, Cambridge U.P. (1879,1903).Google Scholar
26. Thomson, W., Reprint of papers on electrostatics and magnetism, Macmillan (1872).Google Scholar
27. Todhunter, I. and Pearson, K., A history of the elasticity and strength of materials, vol. 1, Cambridge U.P. (1886).Google Scholar
28. Weatherburn, C.E., Advanced vector analysis. Bell (1924).Google Scholar
29. Whittaker, E.T., A history of the theories of aether and electricity, reprinted by Dover (1989).Google Scholar