Robert Allen Fefferman is an American mathematician who has taught at the University of Chicago since 1975. He is known for his research in harmonic analysis and partial differential equations and is regarded as one of the founders of modern multi-parameter Fourier analysis. He also served as chairman of the university's mathematics department and as dean of its Physical Sciences Division.
Background
Robert Allen Fefferman was born on July 20, 1951, in Washington, District of Columbia, United States. Washington is the national capital of the United States, and the District of Columbia is a federal district that is separate from any state.
His brother Charles Fefferman, born in 1949, also became a mathematician and later held a professorship at Princeton University. Both brothers entered a discipline that developed substantially within American universities and research institutions in the decades after the Second World War.
Education
Fefferman received his Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics from the University of Maryland in 1972. The institution traces its origins to 1856, when it was founded as the Maryland Agricultural College, and it later became the flagship campus of the state's public university system.
From 1972 to 1975 he studied at Princeton University, where his advisor was Elias Stein, and he received a Master of Science degree in 1973 and a Doctor of Philosophy in 1975. Princeton was founded in 1746 as the College of New Jersey and adopted the name Princeton University in 1896. During his graduate years, harmonic analysis, the study of how functions can be broken into simpler oscillating components, was a central field of research there.
Fefferman's academic career has been based at the University of Chicago, which was founded in 1890 and had developed a strong mathematics department by the 1970s. He began as an L.E. Dickson Instructor in the Department of Mathematics in 1975 and remained at the university for one year in that post. The instructorship was named for Leonard Eugene Dickson, a mathematician who had taught at Chicago for many years.
He served as assistant professor from 1976 to 1980 and as associate professor from 1980 to 1983. He was promoted to professor in 1983, and during this period he received the Sloan Foundation fellowship in 1981 and the Quantrell Award for teaching in 1982. Sloan Foundation fellowships support early-career researchers in American science and engineering.
From 1995 to 2001 he served as chairman of the Department of Mathematics. On July 1, 2003, he began a five-year term as dean of the Division of the Physical Sciences, which includes the university's mathematics, physics, chemistry, and related scientific departments, and he was named Max Mason Distinguished Service Professor in Mathematics. He served as dean for ten years, until 2013.
His research centers on harmonic analysis, partial differential equations, and probability theory, and his work has extended classical harmonic analysis on Euclidean spaces to multi-parameter settings. He has delivered invited lectures abroad, including the Seventh Rubio de Francia Memorial Lecture in Madrid. He has also worked with Chicago Public School teachers for more than two decades to improve mathematics education.
Fefferman is regarded as one of the founders of modern multi-parameter Fourier analysis, a branch of harmonic analysis that extends classical methods to functions with several independent parameters. His work includes contributions to differentiation theory, weighted norm inequalities, and applications of harmonic analysis to elliptic equations.
He was invited to deliver named lectures at other institutions, including the Seventh Rubio de Francia Memorial Lecture in Madrid and the Riviere-Fabes Memorial Lectures at the University of Minnesota.
(Cambridge Mathematical Library paperback edition of A. Zy...)
2003
Membership
Fefferman is a member of the American Mathematical Society, which was founded in 1888 and promotes mathematical research and communication among mathematicians. In 2009 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, a learned society founded in 1780 to recognize scholarship and leadership across many fields. In the same year he was named a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, an organization founded in 1848 that supports scientific progress and public understanding of science.
American Mathematical Society
Elected member
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
2009
Fellow
American Association for the Advancement of Science
2009
Connections
He married Joan L. Fefferman on December 17, 1982. The couple has three children: William, Ann, and Marie.
His brother Charles Fefferman is also a mathematician. Charles, who received the Fields Medal in 1978, has held a professorship at Princeton University and was appointed a full professor at the University of Chicago at a young age.
child:
Ann Fefferman
child:
Marie Fefferman
child:
William Fefferman
Brother:
Charles Fefferman
Mathematician born in 1949 who has been a professor at Princeton University and received the Fields Medal in 1978.
References
Robert Fefferman, Department of Mathematics, University of Chicago
Faculty profile giving his research areas in harmonic analysis and elliptic partial differential equations, his title as Max Mason Distinguished Service Professor, and his degrees from the University of Maryland and Princeton University.
Preface for the special issue in honor of Robert Fefferman
Preface to a special issue of the journal Advanced Nonlinear Studies dedicated to his career, describing his contributions to harmonic analysis and partial differential equations and his service as chair and dean at the University of Chicago.
2023
Faculty receive DSPs, named professorships
University of Chicago Chronicle report on his appointment as dean of the Physical Sciences Division and as Max Mason Distinguished Service Professor, including his teaching honor and mathematics outreach.
Robert Fefferman
Faculty biography describing his role as Max Mason Distinguished Service Professor, his tenure as dean of the Physical Sciences Division from 2003 to 2013, his Sloan fellowship, his Quantrell Award, and his degrees.
Llewellyn John and Harriet Manchester Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching
Awarded by the University of Chicago in 1982 for excellence in undergraduate teaching. The award was established in 1938 through an anonymous endowment from trustee Ernest Quantrell and is believed to be the oldest prize for undergraduate teaching in the United States.
Awarded by the University of Chicago in 1982 for excellence in undergraduate teaching. The award was established in 1938 through an anonymous endowment from trustee Ernest Quantrell and is believed to be the oldest prize for undergraduate teaching in the United States.
Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Fellowship
Fellowship of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, awarded in 1981. Sloan fellowships support early-career researchers in science.
Fellowship of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, awarded in 1981. Sloan fellowships support early-career researchers in science.
Fellow of the American Mathematical Society
Named to the 2022 class of fellows of the American Mathematical Society, a recognition conferred on members for distinguished contributions to the mathematical community.
Named to the 2022 class of fellows of the American Mathematical Society, a recognition conferred on members for distinguished contributions to the mathematical community.
