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The Birth of The Last Universalist
✨ The first contribution brought to the world from Poincare, was from his being born. ✨ Jules Henri Poincare was born on Saturday, April 29,1854 at ~ 0100 hours or 01:00 AM in Nancy, France. At 5 y/o Henri contracted diphtheria for which his mother Eugénie Launois educated him from home until the age of 8. In 1862 he entered the Lycée in Nancy (which has now been re-named after him) and studied there for 11 years. He graduated in 1871 with a bachelor's degree in letters and sciences at 17. -
Qualitative Theory of Differential Equations - originated from Poincaré & Aleksandr Lyapunov's works
Poincaré wrote a set of memoirs titled"On Curves Defined By Differential Equations" (1881-1882).In them,he had created a new branch of math:the Qualitative Theory of Differential Equations.With this math one is able to gather a lot of data about the properties of the solutions to a differential equation if it can't be solved with known functions.He focused on researching the nature of the trajectories of the integral curves in the plane & introduced the concepts of the limit cycle,& loop index. -
The Analysis of the 3 Body Problem which indirectly led to The Chaos Theory
King Oscar of Sweden and Norway began a competition in celebration of his 60th birthday and that was on the movement of bodies in space.Poincare solved the 3 body problem through a series of "approximation of the orbits",although it was a partial solution he won.Shortly after, an error was discovered and he frantically revised all his work. He realized that a very small change in initial conditions could lead to extremely different orbits. This "mistake" led to what we now know as Chaos Theory. -
Rise of Algebraic Topology / "Analysis Situs" was published by Henri Poincare
Not in particular order given the difficulty in obtaining exact dates for Poincare's contributions, I will be sharing some of his most influential works. 1: Algebraic Topology. Henri published "Analysis Situs" in 1895. He went on to publish 5 additional papers from 1999~1904. His publications were revolutionary in the field of math and physics. Through the use of algebraic structures to compare non-homeomorphic topological spaces he provided the very first organized treatment of topology. -
Algebraic Topology: Poincare's Conjecture
Here attached is a very engaging video on the conjecture posed by Henri Poincaré on the branch of mathematics that stemmed mostly because of his research and contribution to it, and that is: Algebraic Topology.
✨: https://youtu.be/GItmC9lxeco
According to WolframMathWorld online, the conjecture describes: "every simply connected closed three-manifold is homeomorphic to the three-sphere, where a three-sphere is simply a generalization of the usual sphere to one dimension higher..." -
Poincare's Predictions of Gravitational Waves prior or simultaneous to Einstein's proposal
Works:✨Note: "Sur la dynamique de l'électron"(On Electron Dynamics) 1905/French Académie des Sciences.✨Book: "La Science et l’Hypothèse" 1902.
Gravitational waves and their traveling at the speed of light was predicted by Poincaré early on. In fact,in his intellectual note "On Electron Dynamics" he explained that it was a definitive must in relativistic space-time geometry and general relativity. Later on,in 1916,Einstein brought up the existence of gravitational waves from his field equations. -
The Passing of Poincaré's Knowledge to the Future of Science
Jules Henri Poincaré passed away in Paris. He had gone into surgery for a prostate situation from which he was cleared and "good to go." As he prepared to leave the hospital and began clothing himself, he collapsed and died. Poincaré died of an embolism, or blood accumulation in the brain. He passed at the young age of 58. His remains are at the Poincaré family vault in the cemetery of Montparnasse, France.
To this day we continue to be inspired by his legacy of science and contributions.
