Adrien-Marie Legendre (1752-1833) e suas obras em Teoria dos Números

The present thesis is an analysis of Adrien-Marie Legendre s works on Number Theory, with a certain emphasis on his 1830 edition of Theory of Numbers. The role played by these works in their historical context and their influence on the development of Number Theory was investigated. A biographic study of Legendre (1752-1833) was undertaken, in which both his personal relations and his scientific productions were related to certain historical elements of the development of both his homeland, France, and the sciences in general, during the 18th and 19th centuries This study revealed notable characteristics of his personality, as well as his attitudes toward his mathematical contemporaries, especially with regard to his seemingly incessant quarrels with Gauss about the priority of various of their scientific discoveries. This is followed by a systematic study of Lagrange s work on Number Theory, including a comparative reading of certain topics, especially that of his renowned law of quadratic reciprocity, with texts of some of his contemporaries. In this way, the dynamics of the evolution of his thought in relation to his semantics, the organization of his demonstrations and his number theoretical discoveries was delimited. Finally, the impact of Legendre s work on Number Theory on the French mathematical community of the time was investigated. This investigation revealed that he not only made substantial contributions to this branch of Mathematics, but also inspired other mathematicians to advance this science even further. This indeed is a fitting legacy for his Theory of Numbers, the first modern text on Higher Arithmetic, on which he labored half his life, producing various editions. Nevertheless, Legendre also received many posthumous honors, including having his name perpetuated on the Trocadéro face of the Eiffel Tower, which contains a list of 72 eminent scientists, and having a street and an alley in Paris named after him

De solutione problematum diophanteorum per números integros : o primeiro trabalho de Euler sobre equações diofantinas

The present dissertation analyses Leonhard Euler´s early mathematical work as Diophantine Equations, De solutione problematum diophanteorum per números íntegros (On the solution of Diophantine problems in integers). It was published in 1738, although it had been presented to the St Petersburg Academy of Science five years earlier. Euler solves the problem of making the general second degree expression a perfect square, i.e., he seeks the whole number solutions to the equation ax2+bx+c = y2. For this purpose, he shows how to generate new solutions from those already obtained. Accordingly, he makes a succession of substitutions equating terms and eliminating variables until the problem reduces to finding the solution of the Pell Equation. Euler erroneously assigns this type of equation to Pell. He also makes a number of restrictions to the equation ax2+bx+c = y and works on several subthemes, from incomplete equations to polygonal numbers

Os artigos de Euler sobre os números amigáveis

Among the many methodological resources that the mathematics teacher can use in the classroom, we can cite the History of Mathematics which has contributed to the development of activities that promotes students curiosity about mathematics and its history. In this regard, the present dissertation aims to translate and analyze, mathematically and historically, the three works of Euler about amicable numbers that were writed during the Eighteenth century with the same title: De numeris amicabilibus. These works, despite being written in 1747 when Euler lived in Berlin, were published in different times and places. The first, published in 1747 in Nova Acta Eruditorum and which received the number E100 in the Eneström index, summarizes the historical context of amicable numbers, mentions the formula 2nxy & 2nz used by his precursors and presents a table containing thirty pairs of amicable numbers. The second work, E152, was published in 1750 in Opuscula varii argument. It is the result of a comprehensive review of Euler s research on amicable numbers which resulted in a catalog containing 61 pairs, a quantity which had never been achieved by any mathematician before Euler. Finally, the third work, E798, which was published in 1849 at the Opera postuma, was probably the first among the three works, to be written by Euler