Richard S. Pierce

Richard Scott Pierce was an American logician and mathematician. His book on associative algebras has become a standard reference and graduate textbook.

Richard Scott Pierce was born on February 26, 1927 in Los Angeles County, California.[1] He studied at California Institute of Technology, earning his bachelor degree in 1950 and Ph.D. in 1952. This thesis, Homomorphisms of a Modular Lattice, was supervised by Robert P. Dilworth, a proponent of lattice theory.

For post-graduate study Pierce went to Yale University, where he was a fellow in the Office of Naval Research. From 1953 to 1955, he studied at Harvard University as a Jewette Research Fellow.

In 1955, he commenced his teaching career at the University of Washington. In 1956 he and Garrett Birkhoff formulated a conjecture concerning polynomial approximation, called the Pierce–Birkhoff conjecture. He served as thesis advisor for Gloria Conyers Hewitt in 1962.

In 1970, he moved to the University of Hawaii, and in 1975 to the University of Arizona.[2]

Various algebraic structures were profiled in Pierce's work, especially Boolean algebras and associative algebras.

Pierce died on March 15, 1992. After his death, family and friends established The Richard Scott Memorial Endowment to support outstanding undergraduate math majors at University of Arizona.[3]

Selected works

  • 1956: Birkhoff, Garrett; Pierce, Richard S. "Lattice-ordered rings". Anais da Academia Brasileira de Ciências. 28: 41–69. MR 0080099. Zbl 0070.26602.
  • 1959: Traslation Lattices via Google Books
  • 1967: Modules over Commutative Regular Rings via Google Books
  • 1968: Introduction to the Theory of Abstract Algebras, Holt, Reinhart & Winston[4]
  • 1972: Compact Zero-dimensional Metric Spaces of Finite Type, American Mathematical Society
  • 1982: Associative Algebras, Graduate Texts in Mathematics #88
  • 1984: History of the Mathematics Department from University of Arizona
  • 1989: "Countable Boolean algebras", pages 775 to 876 in J.D. Monk & R. Bonnet (eds.), Handbook of Boolean Algebras (Amsterdam/New York/Oxford/Tokyo, North-Holland), vol. 3

References

  1. ^ Richard Scott Pierce @ California Birth Index
  2. ^ Irving Anellis (February 1993) "In Memorium: Richard S. Pierce (1927 to 1992)", Modern Logic 3(2)
  3. ^ Undergraduate scholarships @ University of Arizona
  4. ^ H. Lasker Review: Introduction to the Theory of Abstract Algebras, Canadian Mathematical Bulletin
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