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| {{Infobox scientist
| | The author is known as Wilber Pegues. Invoicing is what I do. North Carolina is the place he loves most but now he is contemplating other options. What me and my family members adore is to climb but I'm considering on beginning some thing new.<br><br>Here is my homepage: psychic readers [[http://www.dabber.com/u2b/uprofile.php?UID=485302 www.dabber.com sources]] |
| | name = Atle Selberg
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| | image = Atle Selberg.jpg
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| | image_size = 200px
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| | birth_date = {{Birth date|1917|6|14|df=y}}
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| | birth_place = [[Langesund]], [[Norway]]
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| | death_date = {{Death date and age|2007|8|6|1917|6|14|df=y}}
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| | death_place = [[Princeton, New Jersey|Princeton]], [[New Jersey]], [[United States]]
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| | residence =
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| | nationality = Norwegian
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| | field = [[Mathematician|Mathematics]]
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| | alma_mater = [[University of Oslo]]
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| | academic_advisors =
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| | known_for = [[Chowla–Selberg formula]] <br /> [[Critical line theorem]] <br /> [[Maass–Selberg relations]] <br /> [[Selberg class]] <br /> [[Selberg's conjecture]] <br /> [[Selberg integral]] <br /> [[Selberg trace formula]] <br /> [[Selberg zeta function]] <br /> [[Selberg sieve]]
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| | awards = [[Abel Prize]] (honorary) <br /> [[Fields Medal]] <br /> [[Wolf Prize]] <br /> [[Gunnerus Medal]]
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| | influences = [[Srinivasa Ramanujan]]
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| }}
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| '''Atle Selberg''' (14 June 1917 – 6 August 2007) was a [[Norway|Norwegian]] [[mathematician]] known for his work in [[analytic number theory]], and in the theory of [[automorphic form]]s, in particular bringing them into relation with [[spectral theory]]. He was awarded the [[Fields Medal]] in 1950.
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| == Early years ==
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| Selberg was born in [[Langesund]], [[Norway]], the son of teacher Anna Kristina Selberg and mathematician [[Ole Michael Ludvigsen Selberg]]. Two of his brothers also went on to become mathematicians as well, and the remaining one became a professor of engineering.
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| <!-- There seems to be no source for the following anecdote, and the reference given does not mention Selberg:
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| His first result came at age 14 when he found[[Johann Bernoulli]]'s remarkable 1697 formula
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| :<math>\sum_{n=1}^\infty n^{-n} = \int_0^1 x^{-x} dx\quad\quad(=1.291285997...)</math>
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| which he published as a problem in the book ''Problems and Theorems in Analysis'' (part I, problem 160) by [[Pólya]] and [[Gábor Szegö]].
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| -->
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| While he was still at school he was influenced by the work of [[Srinivasa Ramanujan]] and he found the exact analytical formula for the [[Partition (number theory)#Partition function|partition function]] as suggested by the works of Ramanujan; however, this result was first published by [[Hans Rademacher]]. During the war he fought against the German invasion of Norway, and was imprisoned several times.
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| He studied at the [[University of Oslo]] and completed his [[Ph.D.]] in 1943.
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| == World War II ==
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| During [[World War II]], Selberg worked in isolation due to the [[German occupation of Norway]]. After the war his accomplishments became known, including a proof that a positive proportion of the zeros of the [[Riemann zeta function]] lie on the line <math>\Re(s)=\tfrac{1}{2}</math>.
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| After the war, he turned to [[sieve theory]], a previously neglected topic which Selberg's work brought into prominence. In a 1947 paper he introduced the [[Selberg sieve]], a method well adapted in particular to providing auxiliary upper bounds, and which contributed to [[Chen's theorem]], among other important results.
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| In March 1948, Selberg established, by elementary means, the asymptotic formula
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| :<math>\vartheta \left( x \right)\log \left( x \right) + \sum\limits_{p \le x} {\log \left( p \right)} \vartheta \left( {\frac{x}{p}} \right) = 2x\log \left( x \right) + O\left( x \right)</math>
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| where
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| :<math>\vartheta \left( x \right) = \sum\limits_{p \le x} {\log \left( p \right)}</math>
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| for primes <math>p</math>. By July of that year, Selberg and [[Paul Erdős]] had each obtained [[elementary proof]]s of the [[prime number theorem]], both using Selberg's then unpublished asymptotic formula as a starting point.<ref>{{cite journal|author=Spencer, Joel|author2=Graham, Ronald|title=The Elementary Proof of the Prime Number Theorem|journal=The Mathematical Intelligencer|year=2009|volume=31|issue=3|pages=18–23|url=http://www.cs.nyu.edu/spencer/erdosselberg.pdf}}</ref> Circumstances leading up to the proofs, as well as publication disagreements, led to a bitter dispute between the two mathematicians.<ref name=goldfeld>{{Cite journal | last = Goldfeld | first = Dorian | year = 2003 | title = The Elementary Proof of the Prime Number Theorem: an Historical Perspective | journal = Number Theory: New York Seminar | pages = 179–192}}</ref><ref name=interview>{{Cite journal|url=http://www.ams.org/bull/2008-45-04/S0273-0979-08-01223-8/S0273-0979-08-01223-8.pdf |first=Nils A.|last= Baas|first2= Christian F.|last2= Skau |journal= Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. |volume=45 |year=2008|pages= 617–649 |title=The lord of the numbers, Atle Selberg. On his life and mathematics|doi=10.1090/S0273-0979-08-01223-8|issue=4|postscript=<!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}}}</ref>
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| For his fundamental accomplishments during the 1940s, Selberg received the 1950 [[Fields Medal]].
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| == Institute for Advanced Study ==
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| Selberg moved to the [[United States]] and settled at the [[Institute for Advanced Study]] in [[Princeton, New Jersey]] in the 1950s where he remained until his death. During the 1950s he worked on introducing [[spectral theory]] into [[number theory]], culminating in his development of the [[Selberg trace formula]], the most famous and influential of his results. In its simplest form, this establishes a duality between the lengths of [[closed geodesic]]s on a [[compact Riemann surface]] and the [[eigenvalue]]s of the [[Laplace-Beltrami operator|Laplacian]], which is analogous to the duality between the [[prime number]]s and the zeros of the zeta function.
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| He was awarded the 1986 [[Wolf Prize in Mathematics]]. He was also awarded an honorary [[Abel Prize]] in 2002, its founding year, before the awarding of the regular prizes began.
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| Selberg received many distinctions for his work in addition to the [[Fields Medal]], the [[Wolf Prize]] and the [[Gunnerus Medal]]. He was elected to the [[Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters]], the [[Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters]] and the [[American Academy of Arts and Sciences]].
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| Selberg had two children, Ingrid Selberg and Lars Selberg. Ingrid Selberg is married to playwright [[Mustapha Matura]].
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| He died at home in Princeton on 6 August 2007 of heart failure.<ref>{{cite news |first= |last= |authorlink= |coauthors= |title=Atle Selberg, 90, Lauded Mathematician, Dies |publisher=[[New York Times]] |date=2007-08-17|url=http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/17/nyregion/17selberg.html}}</ref>
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| == Selected publications ==
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| * ''Atle Selberg Collected Papers: 1'' (Springer-Verlag, Heidelberg), ISBN 0-387-18389-2
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| * ''Collected Papers'' (Springer-Verlag, Heidelberg Mai 1998), ISBN 3-540-50626-8
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| == References ==
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| {{reflist}}
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| * Donald J. Albers & Gerald L. Alexanderson (2011) ''Fascinating Mathematical People: interviews and memoirs'', "Atle Selberg", pp 254–73, [[Princeton University Press]], ISBN 978-0-691-14829-8 .
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| ==Further reading==
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| * {{Cite journal|url=http://www.ams.org/bull/2008-45-04/S0273-0979-08-01223-8/
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| |first=Nils A.|last= Baas|first2= Christian F.|last2= Skau
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| |journal= Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. |volume=45 |year=2008|pages= 617–649
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| |title=The lord of the numbers, Atle Selberg. On his life and mathematics|doi=10.1090/S0273-0979-08-01223-8|issue=4|postscript=<!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}}} Interview with Selberg
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| *{{Cite journal | author = [[Dennis Hejhal|Hejhal, Dennis]] |date=June–July 2009 | title = Remembering Atle Selberg, 1917–2007 | journal = [[Notices of the American Mathematical Society]] | volume = 56
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| | issue = 6 | pages = 692–710 | url = http://www.ams.org/notices/200906/rtx090600692p-corrected.pdf
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| | format = PDF}}
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| * {{Cite web|last=Selberg |url=http://www.ias.ac.in/resonance/Dec1996/pdf/Dec1996Reflections.pdf |title=Reflections Around the Ramanujan Centenary|year=1996|postscript=<!-- Bot inserted parameter. Either remove it; or change its value to "." for the cite to end in a ".", as necessary. -->{{inconsistent citations}}}}
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| ==External links==
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| * {{Britannica|533117}}
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| * {{MacTutor Biography|id=Selberg}}
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| * {{MathGenealogy|id=121277}}
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| * [http://publications.ias.edu/selberg Atle Selberg Archive webpage]
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| * [http://www.ias.edu/newsroom/announcements/view/1186683853.html Obituary at IAS]
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| * [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article2477242.ece Obituary in ''The Times'']
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| {{Fields medalists}}
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| {{Wolf Prize in Mathematics}}
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| {{Authority control|PND=117725161|LCCN=n/88/118373|VIAF=24667118|SELIBR=}}
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| {{Persondata <!-- Metadata: see [[Wikipedia:Persondata]]. -->
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| | NAME = Selberg, Atle
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| | ALTERNATIVE NAMES =
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| | SHORT DESCRIPTION = Mathematician
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| | DATE OF BIRTH = 14 June 1917
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| | PLACE OF BIRTH = [[Langesund]], [[Norway]]
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| | DATE OF DEATH = 6 August 2007
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| | PLACE OF DEATH = [[Princeton, New Jersey]], [[United States]]
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| }}
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| {{DEFAULTSORT:Selberg, Atle}}
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| [[Category:1917 births]]
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| [[Category:2007 deaths]]
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| [[Category:20th-century mathematicians]]
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| [[Category:American mathematicians]]
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| [[Category:Fields Medalists]]
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| [[Category:Institute for Advanced Study faculty]]
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| [[Category:Members of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters]]
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| [[Category:Members of the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters]]
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| [[Category:Norwegian emigrants to the United States]]
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| [[Category:Norwegian mathematicians]]
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| [[Category:Number theorists]]
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| [[Category:People from Bamble]]
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| [[Category:University of Oslo alumni]]
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| [[Category:Wolf Prize in Mathematics laureates]]
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