Ulam, Stanislaw M. (Stanislaw Marcin), 1909-1985

Stanislaw Ulam was gifted mathematician who, during the course of his career, made significant contributions to set theory, topology, ergodic theory, probability, cellular automata theory, the study of nonlinear processes, the function of real variables, mathematical logic, and number theory. Perhaps his greatest achievement was the development of the Monte Carlo method for solving complex mathematical problems by electronic random sampling, but he made equally noteworthy contributions in hydrodynamics (three-dimensional fluid flow), the development of nuclear propulsion for space flight (Project Orion), and in fields as disparate as physics, biology, and astronomy. Yet despite the breadth of his scholarship, Ulam is most often remembered for the central role he played in the early development of the American hydrogen bomb.

Stanislaw Marcin Ulam was born in Lwów, Poland on April 13, 1909. The son of Jozef Ulam, a lawyer, and Anna Auerbach, the daughter of an industrialist, Ulam developed an enthusiasm for astronomy and physics while still in his teens that led him into the serious study of mathematics. Enrolling at the Lwów Polytechnic Institute in 1927, he received his bachelor's (1931), master's (1932), and doctoral degrees in rapid succession (1933), intending on an academic career. Following receipt of his degree and a tour of Europe during which he visited mathematicians and scientists in Vienna, Zurich, Paris, and Cambridge, Ulam received an invitation from fellow mathematician, John von Neumann, to become a visiting scholar for three months at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. There, he met G. D. Birkhoff, who brought him to Harvard to become one of the earliest members of the Society of Fellows (1936-1939) and later, lecturer (1940). During his five years in Cambridge, Ulam traveled back and forth between Poland and the States, and shortly after he suffered the death of his mother, his younger brother, Adam, was sent to join Stan in America. Adam was encouraged to enroll at Brown University, where Stanislaw was engaged in substitute teaching a graduate course on the theory of functions of several real variables.

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