Mathematician
Adrien-Marie Legendre
French: [adrien mari le-ZHAHN-druh] (IPA: [adʁiɛ̃ maʁi ləʒɑ̃dʁ])
Modern
Adrien-Marie Legendre (1752-1833) was a French mathematician who made foundational contributions to number theory, statistics and elliptic functions. He first communicated the method of least squares in 1806, conjectured the law of quadratic reciprocity later proved by Gauss, proved Fermat's Last Theorem for the exponent five in 1830, and authored Elements de geometrie (1794), the leading elementary geometry textbook for roughly a century. In 1808 he conjectured that a prime always lies between consecutive perfect squares, a claim still unproven and now known as Legendre's Conjecture. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/
Facts
Nationality / Culture Defining ContributionAuthored Elements de geometrie (1794), which stood as the leading elementary geometry textbook for around a century. 1 Defining ContributionConjectured in 1808 that a prime number always lies between two consecutive perfect squares, now called Legendre's Conjecture; it remains unproven. 2 Defining ContributionFirst communicated the method of least squares to his contemporaries before Gauss, publishing it in 1806 as an appendix to his book on the paths of comets; it is now central to regression, signal processing and curve fitting. 1 AwardBerlin Academy prize for research on the trajectories of projectiles (1782). 3 Connections
Associated With
Gauss discovered the method of least squares before Legendre, who was the first to officially publish it in 1805; a documented priority dispute in the history of statistics.
Attributed Works
Source Wikipedia: Beta function
Source Wikipedia: Legendre polynomials
Source Legendre Transformation (Wikipedia)
Source Legendre's Formula (Wikipedia)
Conjectures Posed
Legendre proposed the conjecture in 1808 in his Essai sur la Theorie des Nombres.
Source Legendre's Conjecture (Wikipedia)
In Branch
Namesake Of
Proofs Credited
In the Other Atlases
Nationality
Also in Geography Atlas: the nationality of this subject.
Source Adrien-Marie Legendre (Wikipedia)Lead paragraph of the cited Wikipedia articletier 2Quote, Lead paragraph of the cited Wikipedia article
Adrien-Marie Legendre (; French: [adʁiɛ̃ maʁi ləʒɑ̃dʁ]; 18 September 1752 – 9 January 1833) was a French mathematician who made numerous contributions to mathematics.
Sources
1. Adrien-Marie Legendre (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia FoundationLead section
Adrien-Marie Legendre (; French: [adʁiɛ̃ maʁi ləʒɑ̃dʁ]; 18 September 1752 - 9 January 1833) was a French mathematician who made numerous contributions to mathematics.
Infobox: field
Mathematician
Mathematical work
Legendre is best known as the author of Éléments de géométrie, which was published in 1794 and was the leading elementary text on the topic for around 100 years. This text greatly rearranged and simplified many of the propositions from Euclid's Elements to create a more effective textbook.
Lead section, gender reference
Well-known and important concepts such as the Legendre polynomials and Legendre transformation are named after him.
View the Source 2. Legendre's Conjecture (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia FoundationStatement, opening paragraph
there is a prime number between n squared and (n+1) squared for every positive integer n; proposed by Adrien-Marie Legendre
Conjectures Posed: Legendre's Conjecture, Opening paragraph
proposed by Adrien-Marie Legendre
View the Source 3. Adrien-Marie Legendre, Biography (MacTutor History of Mathematics)
MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St AndrewsEarly career sectionQuote, Early career section
won the Berlin Academy prize for projectile trajectory research in 1782
Legendre Transformation (Wikipedia)
Attributed Works: Legendre Transformation, Lead sentence, attributionQuote, Attributed Works: Legendre Transformation, Lead sentence, attribution
first introduced by Adrien-Marie Legendre in 1787
Wikipedia: Beta function
Attributed Works: Beta Function, Lead sectionQuote, Attributed Works: Beta Function, Lead section
The beta function was studied by Leonhard Euler and Adrien-Marie Legendre
Wikipedia: Legendre polynomials
Attributed Works: Legendre Polynomials, Lead sectionQuote, Attributed Works: Legendre Polynomials, Lead section
Legendre polynomials, named after Adrien-Marie Legendre (1782)
Legendre's Formula (Wikipedia)
Attributed Works: Legendre's Formula, Lead sectionQuote, Attributed Works: Legendre's Formula, Lead section
It is named after Adrien-Marie Legendre.
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