George Kempf
American mathematician (1944–2002)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
George Rushing Kempf (Globe, Arizona, August 12, 1944 – Lawrence, Kansas, July 16, 2002) was a mathematician who worked on algebraic geometry, who proved the Riemann–Kempf singularity theorem, the Kempf–Ness theorem, the Kempf vanishing theorem, and who introduced Kempf varieties.
George Rushing Kempf | |
|---|---|
| Born | 12 August 1944 Globe, Arizona, US |
| Died | 16 July 2002 (aged 57) Lawrence, Kansas, US |
| Alma mater | Johns Hopkins University University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Columbia University |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Mathematician |
| Institutions | Johns Hopkins University |
| Doctoral advisor | Steven Kleiman[1] |
Mumford on Kempf
'I met George in 1970 when he burst on the algebraic geometry scene with a spectacular PhD thesis. His thesis gave a wonderful analysis of the singularities of the subvarieties of the Jacobian of a curve obtained by adding the curve to itself times inside its Jacobian. This was one of the major themes that he pursued throughout his career: understanding the interaction of a curve with its Jacobian and especially to the map from the -fold symmetric product of the curve to the Jacobian. In his thesis he gave a determinantal representation both of and of its tangent cone at all its singular points, which gives you a complete understanding of the nature of these singularities' – David Mumford[2]
'One of the things that distinguished his work was the total mastery with which he used higher cohomology. A paper which, I believe, every new student of algebraic geometry should read, is his elementary proof of the Riemann-Roch theorem on curves: “Algebraic Curves” in Crelle, 1977. That such an old result could be treated with new insight was the work of a master.' – David Mumford[2]