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Srinivasa Ramanujan Aiyangar was an Indian Mathematician who was born

in Erode, India in 1887 on December 22. He was born into a family that

was not very well to do. He went to school at the nearby place,

Kumbakonam. His contributions to the theory of numbers include

pioneering discoveries of the properties of the partition function. When he was 15 years old, he obtained a copy of George Shoobridge

Carr’s Synopsis of Elementary Results in Pure and Applied Mathematics, 2

vol. (1880 –86). This collection of some 6,000 theorems (none of the

material was newer than 1860) aroused his genius. Having verified the

results in Carr’s book, Ramanujan went beyond it, developing his own

theorems and ideas. In 1903 he secured a scholarship to the University of

Madras but lost it the following year because he neglected all other studies

in pursuit of  mathematics. 

Ramanujan continued his work, without employment and living in thepoorest circumstances.

In 1911 Ramanujan published the first of his papers in the Journal of the

Indian Mathematical Society .

His mastery of  continued fractions was unequaled by any living

mathematician. He worked out the Riemann series, the elliptic integrals,

hypergeometric series, the functional equations of the zeta function, and

his own theory of divergent series.

In England Ramanujan made further advances, especially in the partition of

numbers. His papers were published in English and European journals, and

in 1918 he was elected to the Royal Society of London. In 1917 Ramanujan

had contracted tuberculosis and demised in 1920.

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Early Life

Aryabhata(some time misspelled as ‘Aryabhatta’) was one of the

first Indian mathematicians and astronomers belonging to the classical

age. He was born in 476 BC in Tarenaga, a town in Bihar, India. TheUniversity of Nalanda had an observatory in its premises so it is

hypothesized that Aryabhata was the principal of the university as well.

On the other hand some other commentaries mention that he belonged to

Kerala.

Mathematical Work

His chief work was the ‘Ayrabhatiya’ which was a compilation of

mathematics and astronomy. It contains 118 verses. Aryabhata workedon the place value system using letters to signify numbers and stating

qualities. He also came up with an approximation of pi ( ) and area of a

triangle. He introduced the concept of sine in his work called ‘Ardha-

 jya’ which is translated as ‘half -chord’. 

 Astronomical Work

He knew that the earth is rotating on an axis around the sun and the

moon rotated around it. He also discovered the position of nine planetsand stated that these also revolved around the sun. He pointed out the

eclipses; both lunar and solar. Aryabhata stated the correct number of

days in a year that is 365. He was the first person to mention that the

earth was not flat but in fact a spherical shape. He also gave the

circumference and diameter of the earth and the radius of the orbits of 9

 planets.

His works were used by the Greeks and the Arabs to develop further.

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