Jonas Kubilius was a
Lithuanian mathematician who worked in
probability theory and number theory , died he was 90.. He was
rector of
Vilnius University for 32 years, and served one term in the
Lithuanian parliament.
[1][2]
(July 27, 1921 – October 30, 2011)
Life and education
Kubilius was born in Fermos village, Eržvilkas county,
Jurbarkas district municipality,
Lithuania on July 27, 1921. He graduated from Raseiniai high school in 1940 and entered
Vilnius University, from which he graduated
summa cum laude in 1946 after taking off a year to teach mathematics in middle school.
[3]
Kubilius received the
Candidate of Sciences degree in 1951 from
Leningrad University.
[4] His thesis, written under
Yuri Linnik, was titled
Geometry of Prime Numbers.
[3][5] He received the
Doctor of Science degree (
habilitation) in 1957 from the
Steklov Institute of Mathematics in
Moscow.
[4][5]
Career
Kubilius had simultaneous careers at
Vilnius University and at the
Lithuanian Academy of Sciences.
He continued working at the university after receiving his bachelor's
degree in 1946, and worked as a lecturer and assistant professor after
receiving his
Candidate degree in 1951. In 1958 he was promoted to professor and was elected
rector
of the university. He retired from the rector's position in 1991 after
serving almost 33 years, and remained a professor in the university.
[3]
During the
Khrushchev Thaw in the middle 1950's there were attempts to make the university "Lithuanian" by encouraging the use of the
Lithuanian language in place of
Russian and to revive the Department of Lithuanian Literature. This work was started by the rector
Juozas Bulavas, but
Stalinists objected and Bulavas was dismissed.
[6]:50–51 Kubilius replaced him as rector and was more successful in resisting pressure to
Russify the University: he returned Lithuanian language and culture to the forefront of the University.
[7]:190
Česlovas Masaitis attributes Kubilius's success to "his ability to
manipulate within the complex bureaucratic system of the Soviet Union
and mainly because of his international recognition due to his
scientific achievements."
[3]
Kubilius also encouraged the faculty to write research papers in
Lithuanian, English, German, and French, as well as in Russian, and he
himself wrote several textbooks in Lithuanian.
[3]
In 1952 Kubilius became an employee of the
Lithuanian Academy of Sciences in the Physics, Mathematics and Astronomy Sector. He initially promoted the development of
probability theory in Lithuania, and later the development of
differential equations and
mathematical logic. In 1956 the Physical and Technical Institute was reorganized and Kubilius became head of the new Mathematical Sector.
[5] When he became rector of Vilnius University in 1958 he gave up his duties as head and was succeeded by
Vytautas Statulevičius in 1960.
[8] In 1962 he was elected a member of the Academy.
[3] He held a position as Principal Scientific Worker at the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics,
[9] which split from the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences and is now an independent state scientific institute.
[10]
Kubilius's scientific work was in the areas of
number theory and
probability theory.
[3] The
Turán–Kubilius inequality[11]:316 and the Kubilius model
[12]:104 in
probabilistic number theory
are named after him. Eugenijus Manstavičius and Fritz Schweiger wrote
about Kubilius's work in 1992, "the most impressive work has been done
on the statistical theory of arithmetic functions which almost created a
new research area called Probabilistic Number Theory. A monograph
devoted to this topic was translated into English in 1964 and became
very influential."
[13]:xi (The monograph is
Probabilistic Methods in the Theory of Numbers.)
Kubilius organized the first
mathematical olympiad in Lithuania in 1951,
[14] and he wrote books of problems for students to use in preparing for the olympiads.
[3] He was a past president of the
Lithuanian Mathematical Society.
[3]
In addition to his scientific and administrative work, Kubilius was a member of the
Seimas (Lithuanian parliament) from 1992 to 1996.
[15]
Honors and awards
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