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Stefan Bergman (May 5, 1895 – June 6, 1977) was a Polish-born American mathematician whose primary work was in complex analysis. He is best known for the kernel function he discovered while at Berlin University in 1922. This function is known today as the Bergman kernel. Bergman taught for many years at Stanford University, and served as an advisor to several students.[1]

Biography

Born in Częstochowa, Congress Poland, Russian Empire, Bergman received his Ph.D. at Berlin University in 1921 for a dissertation on Fourier analysis. His advisor, Richard von Mises, had a strong influence on him, lasting for the rest of his career.[2] In 1933, Bergman was forced to leave his post at the Berlin University because he was a Jew. He fled first to Russia, where he stayed until 1939, and then to Paris. In 1939, he emigrated to the United States, where he would remain for the rest of life.[2] He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1951.[3] He died in Palo Alto, California, aged 82.
The Bergman Prize

The Stefan Bergman Prize in mathematics, was initiated by Bergman's wife in her will, in memory of her husband's work. The American Mathematical Society supports the prize and selects the committee of judges.[4] The prize is awarded for[4]:

the theory of the kernel function and its applications in real and complex analysis; or
function-theoretic methods in the theory of partial differential equations of elliptic type with a special attention to Bergman's and related operator methods.

Bibliography

Bergmann, Stefan (1934), "Über eine in gewissen Bereichen mit Maximumfläche gültige Integraldarstellung der Funktionen zweier komplexer Variabler: I", Mathematische Zeitschrift 39: 76–94, doi:10.1007/BF01201345, Zbl 0009.26202 (German)
Bergmann, S. (1935), "Über eine in gewissen Bereichen mit Maximumfläche gültige Integraldarstellung der Funktionen zweier komplexer Variabler: II", Mathematische Zeitschrift 39: 605–608, doi:10.1007/BF01201376, Zbl 61.0372.01 (German)
Bergmann, S. (1936), "Über eine Integraldarstellung von Funktionen zweier komplexer Veränderlichen", Recueil Mathématique (Matematicheskii Sbornik) 1 (43) (6): 851–862, Zbl 0016.17001 (German)