Name

While there is a tendency to misspell his name as "Aryabhatta" by analogy with other names
having the "bhatta" suffix, his name is properly spelled Aryabhata: every astronomical text
spells his name thus,[6] including Brahmagupta's references to him "in more than a hundred
places by name".[7] Furthermore, in most instances "Aryabhatta" does not fit the metre
either.[6]

Time and place of birth

Aryabhata mentions in the Aryabhatiya that it was composed 3,600 years into the Kali Yuga,
when he was 23 years old. This corresponds to 499 CE, and implies that he was born in
476.[4]
Aryabhata provides no information about his place of birth. The only information comes
from Bhskara I, who describes Aryabhata as makya, "one belonging to
the amakacountry." During the Buddha's time, a branch of the Amaka people settled in the
region between the Narmada and Godavari rivers in central India; Aryabhata is believed to
have been born there.[6][8]
Other hypotheses
It has been claimed that the amaka (Sanskrit for "stone") where Aryabhata originated may
be the present day Kodungallur which was the historical capital city ofThiruvanchikkulam of
ancient Kerala.[9] This is based on the belief that Kouallr was earlier known as KoumKal-l-r ("city of hard stones"); however, old records show that the city was actually Koumkol-r ("city of strict governance"). Similarly, the fact that several commentaries on the
Aryabhatiya have come from Kerala has been used to suggest that it was Aryabhata's main
place of life and activity; however, many commentaries have come from outside Kerala, and
the Aryasiddhanta was completely unknown in Kerala.[6]
Aryabhata mentions "Lanka" on several occasions in the Aryabhatiya, but his "Lanka" is an
abstraction, standing for a point on the equator at the same longitude as hisUjjayini.[10]

Education
It is fairly certain that, at some point, he went to Kusumapura for advanced studies and lived
there for some time.[11] Both Hindu and Buddhist tradition, as well as Bhskara I (CE 629),
identify Kusumapura as Paliputra, modern Patna.[6] A verse mentions that Aryabhata was
the head of an institution (kulapa) at Kusumapura, and, because the university
of Nalanda was in Pataliputra at the time and had an astronomical observatory, it is
speculated that Aryabhata might have been the head of the Nalanda university as
well.[6]Aryabhata is also reputed to have set up an observatory at the Sun temple
in Taregana, Bihar.[12]

Works
Aryabhata is the author of several treatises on mathematics and astronomy, some of which
are lost.
His major work, Aryabhatiya, a compendium of mathematics and astronomy, was
extensively referred to in the Indian mathematical literature and has survived to modern
times. The mathematical part of the Aryabhatiya covers arithmetic, algebra, plane

trigonometry, and spherical trigonometry. It also contains continued fractions, quadratic

equations, sums-of-power series, and a table of sines.
The Arya-siddhanta, a lost work on astronomical computations, is known through the
writings of Aryabhata's contemporary, Varahamihira, and later mathematicians and
commentators, including Brahmagupta and Bhaskara I. This work appears to be based on
the older Surya Siddhanta and uses the midnight-day reckoning, as opposed to sunrise
in Aryabhatiya. It also contained a description of several astronomical instruments:
the gnomon (shanku-yantra), a shadow instrument (chhAyA-yantra), possibly anglemeasuring devices, semicircular and circular (dhanur-yantra / chakra-yantra), a cylindrical
stick yasti-yantra, an umbrella-shaped device called the chhatra-yantra, and water clocks of
at least two types, bow-shaped and cylindrical.[8]
A third text, which may have survived in the Arabic translation, is Al ntf or Al-nanf. It claims
that it is a translation by Aryabhata, but the Sanskrit name of this work is not known.
Probably dating from the 9th century, it is mentioned by the Persian scholar and chronicler of
India, Ab Rayhn al-Brn.[8]

Aryabhatiya
Main article: Aryabhatiya
Direct details of Aryabhata's work are known only from the Aryabhatiya. The name
"Aryabhatiya" is due to later commentators. Aryabhata himself may not have given it a
name. His disciple Bhaskara I calls it Ashmakatantra (or the treatise from the Ashmaka). It is
also occasionally referred to as Arya-shatas-aShTa (literally, Aryabhata's 108), because
there are 108 verses in the text. It is written in the very terse style typical of sutra literature,
in which each line is an aid to memory for a complex system. Thus, the explication of
meaning is due to commentators. The text consists of the 108 verses and 13 introductory
verses, and is divided into four pdas or chapters:
1. Gitikapada: (13 verses): large units of timekalpa, manvantra, and yugawhich
present a cosmology different from earlier texts such as Lagadha's Vedanga
Jyotisha (c. 1st century BCE). There is also a table of sines (jya), given in a single
verse. The duration of the planetary revolutions during a mahayuga is given as 4.32
million years.
2. Ganitapada (33 verses): covering mensuration (ketra vyvahra), arithmetic and
geometric progressions, gnomon / shadows (shanku-chhAyA),
simple, quadratic,simultaneous, and indeterminate equations
3. Kalakriyapada (25 verses): different units of time and a method for determining the
positions of planets for a given day, calculations concerning the intercalary month
(adhikamAsa), kShaya-tithis, and a seven-day week with names for the days of
week.
4. Golapada (50 verses): Geometric/trigonometric aspects of the celestial sphere,
features of the ecliptic, celestial equator, node, shape of the earth, cause of day and
night, rising of zodiacal signs on horizon, etc. In addition, some versions cite a
few colophons added at the end, extolling the virtues of the work, etc.
The Aryabhatiya presented a number of innovations in mathematics and astronomy in verse
form, which were influential for many centuries. The extreme brevity of the text was

elaborated in commentaries by his disciple Bhaskara I (Bhashya, c. 600 CE) and

by Nilakantha Somayaji in his Aryabhatiya Bhasya, (1465 CE).

Mathematics
Place value system and zero
The place-value system, first seen in the 3rd-century Bakhshali Manuscript, was clearly in
place in his work. While he did not use a symbol for zero, the French mathematicianGeorges
Ifrah argues that knowledge of zero was implicit in Aryabhata's place-value system as a
place holder for the powers of ten with null coefficients[13]
However, Aryabhata did not use the Brahmi numerals. Continuing the Sanskritic tradition
from Vedic times, he used letters of the alphabet to denote numbers, expressing quantities,
such as the table of sines in a mnemonic form.[14]

Approximation of
Aryabhata worked on the approximation for pi ( ), and may have come to the conclusion
that

is irrational. In the second part of the Aryabhatiyam (gaitapda 10), he writes:

caturadhikam atamaaguam dvaistath sahasrm

ayutadvayavikambhasysanno vttapariha.
"Add four to 100, multiply by eight, and then add 62,000. By this rule the circumference of a
circle with a diameter of 20,000 can be approached."
[15]

This implies that the ratio of the circumference to the diameter is

((4 + 100) 8 + 62000)/20000 = 62832/20000 = 3.1416, which is accurate to five significant
figures.
It is speculated that Aryabhata used the word sanna (approaching), to mean that not only is
this an approximation but that the value is incommensurable (or irrational). If this is correct, it
is quite a sophisticated insight, because the irrationality of pi was proved in Europe only in
1761 by Lambert.[16]
After Aryabhatiya was translated into Arabic (c. 820 CE) this approximation was mentioned
in Al-Khwarizmi's book on algebra.[8]

Trigonometry
In Ganitapada 6, Aryabhata gives the area of a triangle as
tribhujasya phalashariram samadalakoti bhujardhasamvargah
that translates to: "for a triangle, the result of a perpendicular with the half-side is the
area."[17]
Aryabhata discussed the concept of sine in his work by the name of ardha-jya, which
literally means "half-chord". For simplicity, people started calling it jya. When Arabic
writers translated his works from Sanskrit into Arabic, they referred it as jiba. However, in
Arabic writings, vowels are omitted, and it was abbreviated as jb. Later writers
substituted it withjaib, meaning "pocket" or "fold (in a garment)". (In Arabic, jiba is a
meaningless word.) Later in the 12th century, when Gherardo of Cremona translated
these writings from Arabic into Latin, he replaced the Arabic jaib with its Latin
counterpart, sinus, which means "cove" or "bay"; thence comes the English sine.

Alphabetic code has been used by him to define a set of increments. If we use
Aryabhata's table and calculate the value of sin(30) (corresponding to hasjha) which is
1719/3438 = 0.5; the value is correct. His alphabetic code is commonly known as the
Aryabhata cipher.[18]

Indeterminate equations
A problem of great interest to Indian mathematicians since ancient times has been to
find integer solutions to equations that have the form ax + by = c, a topic that has come
to be known as diophantine equations. This is an example from Bhskara's commentary
on Aryabhatiya:
Find the number which gives 5 as the remainder when divided by 8, 4 as the
remainder when divided by 9, and 1 as the remainder when divided by 7
That is, find N = 8x+5 = 9y+4 = 7z+1. It turns out that the smallest value for N is 85.
In general, diophantine equations, such as this, can be notoriously difficult. They
were discussed extensively in ancient Vedic text Sulba Sutras, whose more ancient
parts might date to 800 BCE. Aryabhata's method of solving such problems is called
the kuaka() method. Kuttaka means "pulverizing" or "breaking into small
pieces", and the method involves a recursive algorithm for writing the original factors
in smaller numbers. Today this algorithm, elaborated by Bhaskara in 621 CE, is the
standard method for solving first-order diophantine equations and is often referred to
as the Aryabhata algorithm.[19] The diophantine equations are of interest
in cryptology, and the RSA Conference, 2006, focused on the kuttaka method and
earlier work in the Sulbasutras.

Algebra
In Aryabhatiya, Aryabhata provided elegant results for the summation of series of
squares and cubes:[20]

and
(see squared triangular number)

Astronomy
Aryabhata's system of astronomy was called the audAyaka system, in which
days are reckoned from uday, dawn at lanka or "equator". Some of his later
writings on astronomy, which apparently proposed a second model
(or ardha-rAtrikA, midnight) are lost but can be partly reconstructed from the
discussion in Brahmagupta's khanDakhAdyaka. In some texts, he seems to
ascribe the apparent motions of the heavens to the Earth's rotation. He may
have believed that the planet's orbits as elliptical rather than circular.[21][22]

Motions of the solar system

Aryabhata correctly insisted that the earth rotates about its axis daily, and
that the apparent movement of the stars is a relative motion caused by the
rotation of the earth, contrary to the then-prevailing view, that the sky
rotated. This is indicated in the first chapter of the Aryabhatiya, where he

gives the number of rotations of the earth in a yuga,[23]and made more

explicit in his gola chapter:[24]
In the same way that someone in a boat going forward sees an unmoving
[object] going backward, so [someone] on the equator sees the unmoving
stars going uniformly westward. The cause of rising and setting [is that] the
sphere of the stars together with the planets [apparently?] turns due west at
the equator, constantly pushed by the cosmic wind.
Aryabhata described a geocentric model of the solar system, in which the
Sun and Moon are each carried by epicycles. They in turn revolve around
the Earth. In this model, which is also found in the Paitmahasiddhnta (c.
CE 425), the motions of the planets are each governed by two epicycles, a
smaller manda (slow) and a larger ghra (fast). [25]The order of the planets in
terms of distance from earth is taken as: the Moon, Mercury, Venus,
the Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and the asterisms."[8]
The positions and periods of the planets was calculated relative to uniformly
moving points. In the case of Mercury and Venus, they move around the
Earth at the same mean speed as the Sun. In the case of Mars, Jupiter, and
Saturn, they move around the Earth at specific speeds, representing each
planet's motion through the zodiac. Most historians of astronomy consider
that this two-epicycle model reflects elements of pre-Ptolemaic Greek
astronomy.[26] Another element in Aryabhata's model, the ghrocca, the
basic planetary period in relation to the Sun, is seen by some historians as a
sign of an underlying heliocentric model.[27]

Eclipses
Solar and lunar eclipses were scientifically explained by Aryabhata. He
states that the Moon and planets shine by reflected sunlight. Instead of the
prevailing cosmogony in which eclipses were caused by pseudo-planetary
demons Rahu and Ketu, he explains eclipses in terms of shadows cast by
and falling on Earth. These will only occur when the earth-moon orbital plane
intersects the earth-sun orbital plane, at points called lunar nodes. Thus, the
lunar eclipse occurs when the moon enters into the Earth's shadow (verse
gola.37). He discusses at length the size and extent of the Earth's shadow
(verses gola.3848) and then provides the computation and the size of the
eclipsed part during an eclipse. Later Indian astronomers improved on the
calculations, but Aryabhata's methods provided the core. His computational
paradigm was so accurate that 18th-century scientist Guillaume Le Gentil,
during a visit to Pondicherry, India, found the Indian computations of the
duration of the lunar eclipse of 30 August 1765 to be short by 41 seconds,
whereas his charts (by Tobias Mayer, 1752) were long by 68 seconds.[8]

Sidereal periods
Considered in modern English units of time, Aryabhata calculated
the sidereal rotation (the rotation of the earth referencing the fixed stars) as
23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4.1 seconds;[28] the modern value is 23:56:4.091.
Similarly, his value for the length of the sidereal year at 365 days, 6 hours,

12 minutes, and 30 seconds (365.25858 days)[29] is an error of 3 minutes and

20 seconds over the length of a year (365.25636 days).

Heliocentrism
As mentioned, Aryabhata advocated an astronomical model in which the
Earth turns on its own axis. His model also gave corrections
(the gra anomaly) for the speeds of the planets in the sky in terms of the
mean speed of the sun. Thus, it has been suggested that Aryabhata's
calculations were based on an underlying heliocentric model, in which the
planets orbit the Sun,[30][31][32] though this has been rebutted.[33] It has also
been suggested that aspects of Aryabhata's system may have been derived
from an earlier, likely pre-Ptolemaic Greek, heliocentric model of which
Indian astronomers were unaware,[34] though the evidence is scant.[35] The
general consensus is that a synodic anomaly (depending on the position of
the sun) does not imply a physically heliocentric orbit (such corrections being
also present in late Babylonian astronomical texts), and that Aryabhata's
system was not explicitly heliocentric.[36]

Legacy

India's first satellite named after Aryabhata

Aryabhata's work was of great influence in the Indian astronomical tradition

and influenced several neighbouring cultures through translations.
The Arabic translation during the Islamic Golden Age (c. 820 CE), was
particularly influential. Some of his results are cited by Al-Khwarizmi and in
the 10th century Al-Biruni stated that Aryabhata's followers believed that the
Earth rotated on its axis.
His definitions of sine (jya), cosine (kojya), versine (utkrama-jya), and
inverse sine (otkram jya) influenced the birth oftrigonometry. He was also the
first to specify sine and versine (1 cos x) tables, in 3.75 intervals from 0
to 90, to an accuracy of 4 decimal places.
In fact, modern names "sine" and "cosine" are mistranscriptions of the
words jya and kojya as introduced by Aryabhata. As mentioned, they were
translated as jiba and kojiba in Arabic and then misunderstood by Gerard of
Cremona while translating an Arabic geometry text to Latin. He assumed

that jiba was the Arabic word jaib, which means "fold in a garment",
L. sinus (c. 1150).[37]
Aryabhata's astronomical calculation methods were also very influential.
Along with the trigonometric tables, they came to be widely used in the
Islamic world and used to compute many Arabic astronomical tables (zijes).
In particular, the astronomical tables in the work of the Arabic
Spain scientist Al-Zarqali (11th century) were translated into Latin as
the Tables of Toledo (12th century) and remained the most
accurateephemeris used in Europe for centuries.
Calendric calculations devised by Aryabhata and his followers have been in
continuous use in India for the practical purposes of fixing
the Panchangam (the Hindu calendar). In the Islamic world, they formed the
basis of the Jalali calendar introduced in 1073 CE by a group of astronomers
including Omar Khayyam,[38] versions of which (modified in 1925) are the
national calendars in use in Iran and Afghanistan today. The dates of the
Jalali calendar are based on actual solar transit, as in Aryabhata and
earlier Siddhantacalendars. This type of calendar requires an ephemeris for
calculating dates. Although dates were difficult to compute, seasonal errors
were less in the Jalali calendar than in theGregorian calendar.
Aryabhatta Knowledge University (AKU), Patna has been established by
Government of Bihar for the development and management of educational
infrastructure related to technical, medical, management and allied
professional education in his honour. The university is governed by Bihar
State University Act 2008.
India's first satellite Aryabhata and the lunar crater Aryabhata are named in
his honour. An Institute for conducting research in astronomy, astrophysics
and atmospheric sciences is the Aryabhatta Research Institute of
Observational Sciences (ARIES) near Nainital, India. The interschool Aryabhata Maths Competition is also named after him,[39] as isBacillus
aryabhata, a species of bacteria discovered by ISRO scientists in 2009.[40]

Srinivasa Ramanujan (Tamil: ) FRS (

pronunciation (helpinfo))

(22 December 1887 26 April 1920) was an Indian mathematician and autodidact who, with
almost no formal training in pure mathematics, made extraordinary contributions
to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series, and continued fractions. Ramanujan
initially developed his own mathematical research in isolation, which was quickly recognized
by Indian mathematicians. When his skills became apparent to the wider mathematical
community, centered in Europe at the time, he began a famous partnership with the English
mathematician G. H. Hardy. He rediscovered previously known theorems in addition to
producing new work. Ramanujan was said to be a natural genius, in the same league as
mathematicians such as Euler and Gauss.[1]
During his short life, Ramanujan independently compiled nearly 3900 results
(mostly identities and equations).[2] Nearly all his claims have now been proven correct,
although a small number of these results were actually false and some were already

known.[3] He stated results that were both original and highly unconventional, such as
the Ramanujan prime and the Ramanujan theta function, and these have inspired a vast
amount of further research.[4] The Ramanujan Journal, an international publication, was
launched to publish work in all areas of mathematics influenced by his work.[5]
Ramanujan was born on 22 December 1887 in Erode, Madras
Presidency (now Pallipalayam, Erode, Tamil Nadu), at the residence of his maternal
grandparents.[6] His father, K. Srinivasa Iyengar, worked as a clerk in a sari shop and hailed
from the district of Thanjavur.[7] His mother, Komalatammal, was a housewife and also sang
at a local temple.[8] They lived in Sarangapani Street in a traditional home in the town of
Kumbakonam. The family home is now a museum. When Ramanujan was a year and a half
old, his mother gave birth to a son named Sadagopan, who died less than three months
later. In December 1889, Ramanujan had smallpox and recovered, unlike thousands in
the Thanjavur District who died from the disease that year.[9] He moved with his mother to
her parents' house in Kanchipuram, near Madras (now Chennai). In November 1891, and
again in 1894, his mother gave birth to two children, but both children died in infancy.
On 1 October 1892, Ramanujan was enrolled at the local school.[10] In March 1894, he was
moved to a Telugu medium school. After his maternal grandfather lost his job as a court
official in Kanchipuram,[11] Ramanujan and his mother moved back to Kumbakonam and he
was enrolled in the Kangayan Primary School.[12] When his paternal grandfather died, he was
sent back to his maternal grandparents, who were now living in Madras. He did not like
school in Madras, and he tried to avoid attending. His family enlisted a local constable to
make sure he attended school. Within six months, Ramanujan was back in Kumbakonam.[12]
Since Ramanujan's father was at work most of the day, his mother took care of him as a
child. He had a close relationship with her. From her, he learned about tradition
and puranas. He learned to sing religious songs, to attend pujas at the temple and particular
eating habits all of which are part of Brahmin culture.[13] At the Kangayan Primary School,
Ramanujan performed well. Just before the age of 10, in November 1897, he passed his
primary examinations in English, Tamil, geography and arithmetic. With his scores, he stood
first in the district.[14] That year, Ramanujan entered Town Higher Secondary School where
he encountered formal mathematics for the first time.[14]
By age 11, he had exhausted the mathematical knowledge of two college students who were
lodgers at his home. He was later lent a book on advanced trigonometry written byS. L.
Loney.[15][16] He completely mastered this book by the age of 13 and discovered sophisticated
theorems on his own. By 14, he was receiving merit certificates and academic awards which
continued throughout his school career and also assisted the school in the logistics of
assigning its 1200 students (each with their own needs) to its 35-odd teachers.[17] He
completed mathematical exams in half the allotted time, and showed a familiarity
with geometry and infinite series. Ramanujan was shown how to solve cubic equations in
1902 and he went on to find his own method to solve the quartic. The following year, not
knowing that the quintic could not be solved by radicals, he tried (and of course failed) to
solve the quintic.
In 1903 when he was 16, Ramanujan obtained from a friend a library-loaned copy of a book
by G. S. Carr.[18][19] The book was titled A Synopsis of Elementary Results in Pure and
Applied Mathematics and was a collection of 5000 theorems. Ramanujan reportedly studied
the contents of the book in detail.[20] The book is generally acknowledged as a key element in
awakening the genius of Ramanujan.[20] The next year, he had independently developed and

investigated the Bernoulli numbers and had calculated the EulerMascheroni constant up to
15 decimal places.[21] His peers at the time commented that they "rarely understood him" and
"stood in respectful awe" of him.[17]
When he graduated from Town Higher Secondary School in 1904, Ramanujan was awarded
the K. Ranganatha Rao prize for mathematics by the school's headmaster, Krishnaswami
Iyer. Iyer introduced Ramanujan as an outstanding student who deserved scores higher than
the maximum possible marks.[17] He received a scholarship to study at Government Arts
College, Kumbakonam,[22][23] However, Ramanujan was so intent on studying mathematics
that he could not focus on any other subjects and failed most of them, losing his scholarship
in the process.[24] In August 1905, he ran away from home, heading
towards Visakhapatnam and stayed in Rajahmundry[25] for about a month.[26] He later enrolled
at Pachaiyappa's College in Madras. He again excelled in mathematics but performed poorly
in other subjects such as physiology. Ramanujan failed his Fellow of Arts exam in December
1906 and again a year later. Without a degree, he left college and continued to pursue
independent research in mathematics. At this point in his life, he lived in extreme poverty
and was often on the brink of starvation.[27]

Adulthood in India[edit]
On 14 July 1909, Ramanujan was married to a ten-year old bride, Janakiammal (21 March
1899 13 April 1994).[28] She came from Rajendram, a village close to Marudur (Karur
district) Railway Station. Ramanujan's father did not participate in the marriage ceremony. [29]
After the marriage, Ramanujan developed a hydrocele testis, an abnormal swelling of
the tunica vaginalis, an internal membrane in the testicle.[30] The condition could be treated
with a routine surgical operation that would release the blocked fluid in the scrotal sac. His
family did not have the money for the operation, but in January 1910, a doctor volunteered to
do the surgery for free.[31]
After his successful surgery, Ramanujan searched for a job. He stayed at friends' houses
while he went door to door around the city of Madras (now Chennai) looking for a clerical
position. To make some money, he tutored some students at Presidency College who were
preparing for their F.A. exam.[32]
In late 1910, Ramanujan was sick again, possibly as a result of the surgery earlier in the
year. He feared for his health, and even told his friend, R. Radakrishna Iyer, to "hand these
[Ramanujan's mathematical notebooks] over to Professor Singaravelu Mudaliar [the
mathematics professor at Pachaiyappa's College] or to the British professor Edward B.
Ross, of the Madras Christian College."[33] After Ramanujan recovered and got back his
notebooks from Iyer, he took a northbound train from Kumbakonam to Villupuram, a coastal
city under French control.[34][35]

Attention towards mathematics[edit]

Ramanujan met deputy collector V. Ramaswamy Aiyer, who had recently founded the Indian
Mathematical Society.[36] Ramanujan, wishing for a job at the revenue department where
Ramaswamy Aiyer worked, showed him his mathematics notebooks. As Ramaswamy Aiyer
later recalled:

I was struck by the extraordinary mathematical results contained in it [the notebooks]. I had
no mind to smother his genius by an appointment in the lowest rungs of the revenue
department.[37]
Ramaswamy Aiyer sent Ramanujan, with letters of introduction, to his mathematician friends
in Madras.[36] Some of these friends looked at his work and gave him letters of introduction
to R. Ramachandra Rao, the district collector for Nellore and the secretary of the Indian
Mathematical Society.[38][39][40] Ramachandra Rao was impressed by Ramanujan's research
but doubted that it was actually his own work. Ramanujan mentioned a correspondence he
had with Professor Saldhana, a notable Bombaymathematician, in which Saldhana
expressed a lack of understanding of his work but concluded that he was not a
phoney.[41] Ramanujan's friend, C. V. Rajagopalachari, persisted with Ramachandra Rao and
tried to quell any doubts over Ramanujan's academic integrity. Rao agreed to give him
another chance, and he listened as Ramanujan discussed elliptic integrals, hypergeometric
series, and his theory of divergent series, which Rao said ultimately "converted" him to a
belief in Ramanujan's mathematical brilliance.[41] When Rao asked him what he wanted,
Ramanujan replied that he needed some work and financial support. Rao consented and
sent him to Madras. He continued his mathematical research with Rao's financial aid taking
care of his daily needs. Ramanujan, with the help of Ramaswamy Aiyer, had his work
published in the Journal of the Indian Mathematical Society.[42]
One of the first problems he posed in the journal was:

He waited for a solution to be offered in three issues, over six months, but failed to
receive any. At the end, Ramanujan supplied the solution to the problem himself. On
page 105 of his first notebook, he formulated an equation that could be used to solve the
infinitely nested radicals problem.

Using this equation, the answer to the question posed in the Journal was simply
3.[43] Ramanujan wrote his first formal paper for the Journal on the properties
of Bernoulli numbers. One property he discovered was that the denominators
(sequence A027642 in OEIS) of the fractions of Bernoulli numbers were always
divisible by six. He also devised a method of calculating Bn based on previous
Bernoulli numbers. One of these methods went as follows:
It will be observed that if n is even but not equal to zero,
(i) Bn is a fraction and the numerator of

in its lowest terms is a prime number,

(ii) the denominator of Bn contains each of the factors 2 and 3 once and only once,
(iii)

is an integer and

consequently is

an odd integer.
In his 17-page paper, "Some Properties of Bernoulli's Numbers", Ramanujan gave
three proofs, two corollaries and three conjectures.[44] Ramanujan's writing initially
had many flaws. As Journal editor M. T. Narayana Iyengar noted:

Mr. Ramanujan's methods were so terse and novel and his presentation so lacking
in clearness and precision, that the ordinary [mathematical reader], unaccustomed to
such intellectual gymnastics, could hardly follow him.[45]
Ramanujan later wrote another paper and also continued to provide problems in
the Journal.[46] In early 1912, he got a temporary job in the Madras Accountant
General's office, with a salary of 20 rupees per month. He lasted for only a few
weeks.[47] Toward the end of that assignment he applied for a position under the
Chief Accountant of the Madras Port Trust. In a letter dated 9 February 1912,
Ramanujan wrote:
Sir,
I understand there is a clerkship vacant in your office, and I beg to apply for the
same. I have passed the Matriculation Examination and studied up to the F.A. but
was prevented from pursuing my studies further owing to several untoward
circumstances. I have, however, been devoting all my time to Mathematics and
developing the subject. I can say I am quite confident I can do justice to my work if I
am appointed to the post. I therefore beg to request that you will be good enough to
confer the appointment on me.[48]
Attached to his application was a recommendation from E. W. Middlemast, a
mathematics professor at the Presidency College, who wrote that Ramanujan was "a
young man of quite exceptional capacity in Mathematics".[49] Three weeks after he
had applied, on 1 March, Ramanujan learned that he had been accepted as a Class
III, Grade IV accounting clerk, making 30 rupees per month.[50] At his office,
Ramanujan easily and quickly completed the work he was given, so he spent his
spare time doing mathematical research. Ramanujan's boss, Sir Francis Spring, and
S. Narayana Iyer, a colleague who was also treasurer of the Indian Mathematical
Society, encouraged Ramanujan in his mathematical pursuits.

Contacting English mathematicians[edit]

In the spring of 1913, Narayana Iyer, Ramachandra Rao and E. W. Middlemast tried
to present Ramanujan's work to British mathematicians. One mathematician, M. J.
M. Hill ofUniversity College London, commented that Ramanujan's papers were
riddled with holes.[51] He said that although Ramanujan had "a taste for mathematics,
and some ability", he lacked the educational background and foundation needed to
be accepted by mathematicians.[52] Although Hill did not offer to take Ramanujan on
as a student, he did give thorough and serious professional advice on his work. With
the help of friends, Ramanujan drafted letters to leading mathematicians at
Cambridge University.[53]
The first two professors, H. F. Baker and E. W. Hobson, returned Ramanujan's
papers without comment.[54] On 16 January 1913, Ramanujan wrote to G. H. Hardy.
Coming from an unknown mathematician, the nine pages of mathematics made
Hardy initially view Ramanujan's manuscripts as a possible "fraud".[55] Hardy
recognised some of Ramanujan's formulae but others "seemed scarcely possible to
believe".[56] One of the theorems Hardy found scarcely possible to believe was found
on the bottom of page three (valid for 0 < a < b + 1/2):

Hardy was also impressed by some of Ramanujan's other work relating to infinite
series:

The first result had already been determined by a mathematician named

Bauer. The second one was new to Hardy, and was derived from a class
of functions called ahypergeometric series which had first been
researched by Leonhard Euler and Carl Friedrich Gauss. Compared to
Ramanujan's work on integrals, Hardy found these results "much more
intriguing".[57] After he saw Ramanujan's theorems on continued fractions
on the last page of the manuscripts, Hardy commented that "they
[theorems] defeated me completely; I had never seen anything in the
least like them before".[58] He figured that Ramanujan's theorems "must
be true, because, if they were not true, no one would have the
imagination to invent them".[58] Hardy asked a colleague, J. E. Littlewood,
to take a look at the papers. Littlewood was amazed by the mathematical
genius of Ramanujan. After discussing the papers with Littlewood, Hardy
concluded that the letters were "certainly the most remarkable I have
received" and commented that Ramanujan was "a mathematician of the
highest quality, a man of altogether exceptional originality and
power".[59] One colleague, E. H. Neville, later commented that "not one
[theorem] could have been set in the most advanced mathematical
examination in the world".[60]
On 8 February 1913, Hardy wrote a letter to Ramanujan, expressing his
interest for his work. Hardy also added that it was "essential that I should
see proofs of some of your assertions".[61] Before his letter arrived in
Madras during the third week of February, Hardy contacted the Indian
Office to plan for Ramanujan's trip to Cambridge. Secretary Arthur
Davies of the Advisory Committee for Indian Students met with
Ramanujan to discuss the overseas trip.[62] In accordance with his
Brahmin upbringing, Ramanujan refused to leave his country to "go to a
foreign land".[63] Meanwhile, Ramanujan sent a letter packed with
theorems to Hardy, writing, "I have found a friend in you who views my
labour sympathetically."[64]
To supplement Hardy's endorsement, a former mathematical lecturer
at Trinity College, Cambridge, Gilbert Walker, looked at Ramanujan's
work and expressed amazement, urging him to spend time at
Cambridge.[65] As a result of Walker's endorsement, B. Hanumantha Rao,
a mathematics professor at an engineering college, invited Ramanujan's
colleague Narayana Iyer to a meeting of the Board of Studies in
Mathematics to discuss "what we can do for S. Ramanujan".[66] The
board agreed to grant Ramanujan a research scholarship of 75 rupees
per month for the next two years at the University of Madras.[67] While he

was engaged as a research student, Ramanujan continued to submit

papers to the Journal of the Indian Mathematical Society. In one
instance, Narayana Iyer submitted some theorems of Ramanujan on
summation of series to the above mathematical journal adding "The
following theorem is due to S. Ramanujan, the mathematics student of
Madras University". Later in November, British Professor Edward B.
Ross of Madras Christian College, whom Ramanujan had met a few
years before, stormed into his class one day with his eyes glowing,
asking his students, "Does Ramanujan know Polish?" The reason was
that in one paper, Ramanujan had anticipated the work of a Polish
mathematician whose paper had just arrived by the day's mail.[68] In his
quarterly papers, Ramanujan drew up theorems to make definite
integrals more easily solvable. Working off Giuliano Frullani's 1821
integral theorem, Ramanujan formulated generalisations that could be
made to evaluate formerly unyielding integrals.[69]
Hardy's correspondence with Ramanujan soured after Ramanujan
refused to come to England. Hardy enlisted a colleague lecturing in
Madras, E. H. Neville, to mentor and bring Ramanujan to
England.[70] Neville asked Ramanujan why he would not go to
Cambridge. Ramanujan apparently had now accepted the proposal; as
Neville put it, "Ramanujan needed no converting and that his parents'
opposition had been withdrawn".[60] Apparently, Ramanujan's mother had
a vivid dream in which the family Goddess, the deity of Namagiri,
commanded her "to stand no longer between her son and the fulfilment
of his life's purpose".[60] Ramanujan then set sail for England, leaving his
wife to stay with his parents in India.

Life in England[edit]

Ramanujan (centre) with other scientists at Trinity College

Whewell's Court, Trinity College, Cambridge

Ramanujan boarded the S.S. Nevasa on 17 March 1914, and at 10

o'clock in the morning, the ship departed from Madras.[71] He arrived in
London on 14 April, with E. H. Neville waiting for him with a car. Four
days later, Neville took him to his house on Chesterton Road in
Cambridge. Ramanujan immediately began his work with Littlewood and
Hardy. After six weeks, Ramanujan moved out of Neville's house and
took up residence on Whewell's Court, just a five-minute walk from
Hardy's room.[72] Hardy and Ramanujan began to take a look at
Ramanujan's notebooks. Hardy had already received 120 theorems from
Ramanujan in the first two letters, but there were many more results and
theorems to be found in the notebooks. Hardy saw that some were
wrong, others had already been discovered, while the rest were new
breakthroughs.[73] Ramanujan left a deep impression on Hardy and
Littlewood. Littlewood commented, "I can believe that he's at least
a Jacobi",[74] while Hardy said he "can compare him only with [Leonhard]
Euler or Jacobi."[75]
Ramanujan spent nearly five years in Cambridge collaborating with
Hardy and Littlewood and published a part of his findings there. Hardy
and Ramanujan had highly contrasting personalities. Their collaboration
was a clash of different cultures, beliefs and working styles. Hardy was
an atheist and an apostle of proof and mathematical rigour, whereas
Ramanujan was a deeply religious man and relied very strongly on his
intuition. While in England, Hardy tried his best to fill the gaps in
Ramanujan's education without interrupting his spell of inspiration.
Ramanujan was awarded a Bachelor of Science degree by research
(this degree was later renamed PhD) in March 1916 for his work
on highly composite numbers, the first part of which was published as a
paper in the Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society. The
paper was over 50 pages with different properties of such numbers
proven. Hardy remarked that this was one of the most unusual papers
seen in mathematical research at that time and that Ramanujan showed
extraordinary ingenuity in handling it.[citation needed] On 6 December 1917, he
was elected to the London Mathematical Society. He became a Fellow of
the Royal Society in 1918, becoming the second Indian to do so,
following Ardaseer Cursetjee in 1841, and he was one of the youngest
Fellows in the history of the Royal Society. He was elected "for his
investigation in Elliptic functions and the Theory of Numbers." On 13
October 1918, he became the first Indian to be elected a Fellow of Trinity
College, Cambridge.[76]

Illness and return to India[edit]

Plagued by health problems throughout his life, living in a country far
away from home, and obsessively involved with his mathematics,
Ramanujan's health worsened in England, perhaps exacerbated
by stress and by the scarcity of vegetarian food during the First World

War. He was diagnosed with tuberculosis and a

severe vitamin deficiency and was confined to a sanatorium.
Ramanujan returned to Kumbakonam, Madras Presidency in 1919 and
died soon thereafter at the age of 32. His widow, S. Janaki Ammal,
moved to Mumbai, but returned to Chennai (formerly Madras) in 1950,
where she lived until her death at age 94 in 1994.[29]
A 1994 analysis of Ramanujan's medical records and symptoms by Dr.
D.A.B. Young concluded that it was much more likely he had
hepatic amoebiasis, a parasitic infection of the liver widespread in
Madras, where Ramanujan had spent time. He had two episodes
of dysentery before he left India. When not properly treated, dysentery
can lie dormant for years and lead to hepatic amoebiasis,[77] a difficult
disease to diagnose, but once diagnosed readily cured.[77]

Personality and spiritual life[edit]

Ramanujan has been described as a person with a somewhat shy and
quiet disposition, a dignified man with pleasant manners.[78] He lived a
rather Spartan life while at Cambridge. Ramanujan's first Indian
biographers describe him as rigorously orthodox. Ramanujan credited
his acumen to his family goddess, Mahalakshmi of Namakkal. He looked
to her for inspiration in his work,[79] and claimed to dream of blood drops
that symbolised her male consort, Narasimha, after which he would
receive visions of scrolls of complex mathematical content unfolding
before his eyes.[80] He often said, "An equation for me has no meaning,
unless it represents a thought of God."[81][82]
Hardy cites Ramanujan as remarking that all religions seemed equally
true to him.[83] Hardy further argued that Ramanujan's religiousness had
been romanticised by Westerners and overstatedin reference to his
belief, not practiceby Indian biographers. At the same time, he
remarked on Ramanujan's strict observance of vegetarianism.

Mathematical achievements[edit]
In mathematics, there is a distinction between having an insight and
having a proof. Ramanujan's talent suggested a plethora of formulae that
could then be investigated in depth later. It is said by G. H. Hardy that
Ramanujan's discoveries are unusually rich and that there is often more
to them than initially meets the eye. As a by-product, new directions of
research were opened up. Examples of the most interesting of these
formulae include the intriguing infinite series for , one of which is given
below

This result is based on the negative fundamental discriminant d =

458 = 232 with class number h(d) = 2 (note that 571358 =

26390 and that 9801=9999; 396=499) and is related to the fact

that

Compare to Heegner numbers, which have class number 1 and

yield similar formulae. Ramanujan's series for converges
extraordinarily rapidly (exponentially) and forms the basis of
some of the fastest algorithms currently used to calculate .
Truncating the sum to the first term also gives the
for , which is correct to six

approximation

decimal places. See also the more general RamanujanSato

series.
One of his remarkable capabilities was the rapid solution for
problems. He was sharing a room with P. C. Mahalanobis who
had a problem, "Imagine that you are on a street with houses
marked 1 through n. There is a house in between (x) such that
the sum of the house numbers to left of it equals the sum of the
house numbers to its right. If n is between 50 and 500, what are
n and x?" This is a bivariate problem with multiple solutions.
Ramanujan thought about it and gave the answer with a twist:
He gave a continued fraction. The unusual part was that it was
the solution to the whole class of problems. Mahalanobis was
astounded and asked how he did it. "It is simple. The minute I
heard the problem, I knew that the answer was a continued
fraction. Which continued fraction, I asked myself. Then the
answer came to my mind", Ramanujan replied.[84][85]
His intuition also led him to derive some previously
unknown identities, such as

for all

, where

is the gamma function. Expanding into

series of powers and equating coefficients of

, and

gives some deep identities for the hyperbolic secant.

In 1918, Hardy and Ramanujan studied the partition
function P(n) extensively and gave a non-convergent
asymptotic series that permits exact computation of the
number of partitions of an integer. Hans Rademacher, in
1937, was able to refine their formula to find an exact
convergent series solution to this problem. Ramanujan and
Hardy's work in this area gave rise to a powerful new method
for finding asymptotic formulae, called the circle method.[86]
He discovered mock theta functions in the last year of his
life.[87] For many years these functions were a mystery, but
they are now known to be the holomorphic parts of harmonic
weak Maass forms.

The Ramanujan conjecture[edit]

Main article: RamanujanPetersson conjecture
Although there are numerous statements that could have
borne the name Ramanujan conjecture, there is one
statement that was very influential on later work. In
particular, the connection of this conjecture with conjectures
of Andr Weil in algebraic geometry opened up new areas of
research. That Ramanujan conjecture is an assertion on the
size of the tau-function, which has as generating function the
discriminant modular form (q), a typical cusp form in the
theory of modular forms. It was finally proven in 1973, as a
consequence of Pierre Deligne's proof of the Weil
conjectures. The reduction step involved is complicated.
Deligne won a Fields Medal in 1978 for his work on Weil
conjectures.[88]

Ramanujan's notebooks[edit]
Further information: Ramanujan's lost notebook
While still in Madras, Ramanujan recorded the bulk of his
results in four notebooks of loose leaf paper. These results
were mostly written up without any derivations. This is
probably the origin of the misperception that Ramanujan was
unable to prove his results and simply thought up the final
result directly. Mathematician Bruce C. Berndt, in his review
of these notebooks and Ramanujan's work, says that
Ramanujan most certainly was able to make the proofs of
most of his results, but chose not to.
This style of working may have been for several reasons.
Since paper was very expensive, Ramanujan would do most
of his work and perhaps his proofs on slate, and then
transfer just the results to paper. Using a slate was common
for mathematics students in the Madras Presidency at the
time. He was also quite likely to have been influenced by the
style of G. S. Carr's book studied in his youth, which stated
results without proofs. Finally, it is possible that Ramanujan
considered his workings to be for his personal interest alone;
and therefore recorded only the results.[89]
The first notebook has 351 pages with 16 somewhat
organised chapters and some unorganised material. The
second notebook has 256 pages in 21 chapters and 100
unorganised pages, with the third notebook containing 33
unorganised pages. The results in his notebooks inspired
numerous papers by later mathematicians trying to prove
what he had found. Hardy himself created papers exploring
material from Ramanujan's work as did G. N. Watson, B. M.
Wilson, and Bruce Berndt.[89] A fourth notebook with 87

unorganised pages, the so-called "lost notebook", was

rediscovered in 1976 by George Andrews.[77]
Notebooks 1, 2 and 3 were published as a two-volume set in
1957 by the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR),
Mumbai, India. This was a photocopy edition of the original
manuscripts, in his own handwriting.
In December 2011, as part of the celebrations of the 125th
anniversary of Ramanujan's birth, TIFR republished the
notebooks in a coloured two-volume collector's edition.
These were produced from scanned and microfilmed images
of the original manuscripts by expert archivists of Roja
Muthiah Research Library, Chennai.

Hardy-Ramanujan number
1729[edit]
Main article: 1729 (number)
The number 1729 is known as the HardyRamanujan
number after a famous anecdote of the British
mathematician G. H. Hardy regarding a visit to the hospital to
see Ramanujan. In Hardy's words:[90]

I remember once going to see him when he was

ill at Putney. I had ridden in taxi cab number
1729 and remarked that the number seemed to
me rather a dull one, and that I hoped it was not
an unfavorable omen. "No", he replied, "it is a
very interesting number; it is the smallest
number expressible as the sum of two cubes in
two different ways."

The two different ways are

1729 = 13 + 123 = 93 + 103.
Generalizations of this idea have created the notion of
"taxicab numbers". Coincidentally, 1729 is also
a Carmichael number.

Other mathematicians' views of

Ramanujan[edit]
Hardy said : "He combined a power of generalization, a
feeling for form, and a capacity for rapid modification of
his hypotheses, that were often really startling, and made
him, in his own peculiar field, without a rival in his day.
The limitations of his knowledge were as startling as its
profundity. Here was a man who could work out modular
equations and theorems... to orders unheard of, whose

mastery of continued fractions was... beyond that of any

mathematician in the world, who had found for himself
the functional equation of the zeta function and the
dominant terms of many of the most famous problems in
the analytic theory of numbers; and yet he had never
heard of a doubly periodic function or ofCauchy's
theorem, and had indeed but the vaguest idea of what a
function of a complex variable was...".[91] When asked
about the methods employed by Ramanujan to arrive at
his solutions, Hardy said that they were "arrived at by a
process of mingled argument, intuition, and induction, of
which he was entirely unable to give any coherent
account."[92]He also stated that he had "never met his
equal, and can compare him only with Euler or Jacobi."[92]
Quoting K. Srinivasa Rao,[93] "As for his place in the world
of Mathematics, we quote Bruce C. Berndt: 'Paul
Erds has passed on to us Hardy's personal ratings of
mathematicians. Suppose that we rate mathematicians
on the basis of pure talent on a scale from 0 to 100,
Hardy gave himself a score of 25, J.E. Littlewood
30, David Hilbert 80 and Ramanujan 100.'"
Professor Bruce C. Berndt of the University of Illinois,
during a lecture at IIT Madras in May 2011, stated that
over the last 40 years, as nearly all of Ramanujan's
theorems have been proven right, there had been a
greater appreciation of Ramanujan's work and brilliance.
Further, he stated Ramanujan's work was now pervading
many areas of modern mathematics and physics.[87][94]
In his book Scientific Edge, the physicist Jayant
Narlikar spoke of "Srinivasa Ramanujan, discovered by
the Cambridge mathematician Hardy, whose great
mathematical findings were beginning to be appreciated
from 1915 to 1919. His achievements were to be fully
understood much later, well after his untimely death in
1920. For example, his work on the highly composite
numbers (numbers with a large number of factors)
started a whole new line of investigations in the theory of
such numbers."
During his lifelong mission in educating and propagating
mathematics among the school children in India, Nigeria
and elsewhere, P.K. Srinivasan has continually
introduced Ramanujan's mathematical works.

Recognition[edit]
Further information: List of things named after Srinivasa
Ramanujan

Bust of Ramanujan in the garden ofBirla Industrial &

Technological Museum.

Ramanujan's home state of Tamil Nadu celebrates 22

December (Ramanujan's birthday) as 'State IT Day',
memorialising both the man and his achievements, as a
native of Tamil Nadu. A stamp picturing Ramanujan was
released by the Government of India in 1962 the 75th
anniversary of Ramanujan's birth commemorating his
achievements in the field of number theory,[95] and a new
design was issued on 26 December 2011, by the India
Post.[96][97]
Since the Centennial year of Ramanujan, every year 22
Dec, is celebrated as Ramanujan Day by
the Government Arts College, Kumbakonam where he
had studied and later dropped out. It is celebrated by the
Department of Mathematics by organising one-, two-, or
three-day seminars by inviting eminent scholars from
universities/colleges, and participants are mainly
students of mathematics, research scholars, and
professors from local colleges. It was planned to
celebrate the 125th birthday in a grand manner by
inviting the foreign eminent mathematical scholars of this
century viz., G E Andrews. and Bruce C Berndt, who are
very familiar with the contributions and works of
Ramanujan.
Ramanujan's work and life are celebrated on 22
December at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT),
Madras in Chennai. The Department of Mathematics
celebrates this day by organising a National Symposium
on Mathematical Methods and Applications (NSMMA) for
one day by inviting eminent Indian and foreign scholars.

A prize for young mathematicians from developing

countries has been created in the name of Ramanujan
by the International Centre for Theoretical
Physics (ICTP), in co-operation with the International
Mathematical Union, which nominate members of the
prize committee. The Shanmugha Arts, Science,
Technology & Research Academy (SASTRA), based in
the state of Tamil Nadu in South India, has instituted
the SASTRA Ramanujan Prize of $10,000 to be given
annually to a mathematician not exceeding the age of 32
for outstanding contributions in an area of mathematics
influenced by Ramanujan. The age limit refers to the
years Ramanujan lived, having nevertheless still
achieved many accomplishments. This prize has been
awarded annually since 2005, at an international
conference conducted by SASTRA in Kumbakonam,
Ramanujan's hometown, around Ramanujan's birthday,
22 December.
On the 125th anniversary of his birth, India declared the
birthday of Ramanujan, 22 December, as 'National
Mathematics Day.' The declaration was made by Dr.
Manmohan Singh in Chennai on 26 December
2011.[98] Dr Manmohan Singh also declared that the year
2012 would be celebrated as the National Mathematics
Year.

In popular culture[edit]

Ramanujan, an Indo-British collaboration film,

chronicling the life of Ramanujan, is being made by
the independent film company Camphor
Cinema.[99] The cast and crew include director Gnana
Rajasekaran, cinematographer Sunny Joseph and
editor B. Lenin.[100][101] Popular Indian and English
stars Abhinay Vaddi, Suhasini Maniratnam,Bhama,
Kevin McGowan and Michael Lieber star in pivotal
roles.[102]

Ramanujan is referenced in the 1997 American

film Good Will Hunting.

A film, based on the book The Man Who Knew

Infinity: A Life of the Genius Ramanujan by Robert
Kanigel, is being made by Edward Pressman and
Matthew Brown with R. Madhavan playing
Ramanujan.[103]

A play, First Class Man by Alter Ego

Productions,[104] was based on David Freeman's First
Class Man. The play is centred around Ramanujan

and his complex and dysfunctional relationship with

Hardy. On 16 October 2011, it was announced
that Roger Spottiswoode, best known for his James
Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies, is working on the
film version, starring actor Siddharth. Like the book
and play it is also titled The First Class Man.[105]

A Disappearing Number is a recent British stage

production by the company Complicite that explores
the relationship between Hardy and Ramanujan.

The novel The Indian Clerk by David Leavitt explores

in fiction the events following Ramanujan's letter to
Hardy.[106][107]

On 22 March 1988, the PBS Series Nova aired a

documentary about Ramanujan, "The Man Who
Loved Numbers" (Season 15, Episode 19).[108]

Google honoured him on his 125th birth anniversary

by replacing its logo with a doodle on its home
page.[109]

The television series Numb3rs has the character Dr.

Amita Ramanujan, a professor of applied
mathematics, named after Ramanujan[110]

Ramanujan's story is both referenced and echoed

in Cyril M. Kornbluth's "Gomez".

RAMANUJAN

He was born on 22na of December 1887 in a small village of Tanjore district, Madras. He
failed in English in Intermediate, so his formal studies were stopped but his self-study of
mathematics continued.
He sent a set of 120 theorems to Professor Hardy of Cambridge. As a result he invited
Ramanujan to England.
Ramanujan showed that any big number can be written as sum of not more than four
prime numbers.
He showed that how to divide the number into two or more squares or cubes.
when Mr Litlewood came to see Ramanujan in taxi number 1729, Ramanujan said that
1729 is the smallest number which can be written in the form of sum of cubes of two
numbers in two ways, i.e. 1729 = 93 + 103 = 13 + 123 since then the number 1729 is
called Ramanujans number.
In the third century B.C, Archimedes noted that the ratio of circumference of a circle to
its diameter is constant. The ratio is now called pi ( ) (the 16th letter in the Greek
alphabet series)
The largest numbers the Greeks and the Romans used were 106 whereas Hindus used
numbers as big as 1053 with specific names as early as 5000 B.C. during the Vedic
period.

ARYABHATA

Aryabhatta was born in 476A.D in Kusumpur, India.

He was the first person to say that Earth is spherical and it revolves around the sun.
He gave the formula (a + b)2 = a2 + b2 + 2ab
He taught the method of solving the following problems:

BRAHMAGUPTA

Brahma Gupta was born in 598A.D in Pakistan.

He gave four methods of multiplication.
He gave the following formula, used in G.P series
a + ar + ar2 + ar3 +.. + arn-1 = (arn-1) (r 1)
He gave the following formulae :
Area of a cyclic quadrilateral with side a, b, c, d= (s -a)(s- b)(s -c)(s- d) where 2s = a
+ b + c + d Length of its diagonals

SHAKUNTALA DEVI

She was born in 1939

In 1980, she gave the product of two, thirteen digit numbers within 28 seconds, many
countries have invited her to demonstrate her extraordinary talent.
In Dallas she competed with a computer to see who give the cube root of 188138517
faster, she won. At university of USA she was asked to give the 23rd root of
9167486769200391580986609275853801624831066801443086224071265164279346
5704086709659
3279205767480806790022783016354924852380335745316935111903596577547340
0756818688305 620821016129132845564895780158806771.
She answered in 50seconds. The answer is 546372891. It took a UNIVAC 1108
computer, full one minute (10 seconds more) to confirm that she was right after it was
fed with 13000 instructions. Now she is known to be Human Computer.

BHASKARACHARYA

He was born in a village of Mysore district.

He was the first to give that any number divided by 0 gives infinity (00).
He has written a lot about zero, surds, permutation and combination.
He wrote, The hundredth part of the circumference of a circle seems to be straight. Our
earth is a big sphere and thats why it appears to be flat.
He gave the formulae like sin(A B) = sinA.cosB cosA.sinB

- -
, , , ..

- , , , ..
- , , , ..
, , , ..
- , , , ..
- , , , ..
- ,
, , ..
- , ,
,
..
- , ,
-
, ..
- , , , ..
- ,
,
, ..
-
, ,
, - ..
-
, , , ..
- ,
, , ..
-, , , ..
- , , , ..
-
,
,

, , ..
- , ,
, ..
- , ,
, ..
- , , , ..
- , ,
, ..
,
, , ..
- , , , ..
- ,

, ..
- , , , ..
- , , , ..- ,
, , ..