Algebra

Algebra is the branch of mathematics concerning the study of the rules of operations and
relations, and the constructions and concepts arising from them, including terms, polynomials, equations
and algebraic structures. Together with geometry, analysis, topology, combinatory, and number theory,
algebra is one of the main branches of pure mathematics.

The part of algebra called elementary algebra is often part of the curriculum in secondary
education and introduces the concept of variables representing numbers. Statements based on these
variables are manipulated using the rules of operations that apply to numbers, such as addition. This can
be done for a variety of reasons, including equation solving. Algebra is much broader than elementary
algebra and studies what happens when different rules of operations are used and when operations are
devised for things other than numbers. Addition and multiplication can be generalized and their precise
definitions lead to structures such as groups, rings and fields, studied in the area of mathematics called
abstract algebra.

History of Algebra
By the time of Plato, Greek mathematics had undergone a drastic change. The Greeks created a
geometric algebra where terms were represented by sides of geometric objects, usually lines, that had
letters associated with them. Diophantus (3rd century AD), sometimes called "the father of algebra", was
an Alexandrian Greek mathematician and the author of a series of books called Arithmetica. These texts
deal with solving algebraic equations.

While the word algebra comes from the Arabic language (al-jabr, ‫ الجبر‬literally, restoration) and
much of its methods from Arabic/Islamic mathematics, its roots can be traced to earlier traditions, most
notably ancient Indian mathematics, which had a direct influence on Muhammad ibn Mūsā al-
Khwārizmī (c. 780-850). He learned Indian mathematics and introduced it to the Muslim world through
his famous arithmetic text, Book on Addition and Subtraction after the Method of the Indians. He later
wrote The Compendious Book on Calculation by Completion and Balancing, which established algebra
as a mathematical discipline that is independent of geometry and arithmetic.

The roots of algebra can be traced to the ancient Babylonians, who developed an advanced
arithmetical system with which they were able to do calculations in an algorithmic fashion. The
Babylonians developed formulas to calculate solutions for problems typically solved today by using
linear equations, quadratic equations, and indeterminate linear equations. By contrast, most Egyptians of
this era, as well as Greek and Chinese mathematicians in the 1st millennium BC, usually solved such
equations by geometric methods, such as those described in the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus, Euclid's
Elements, and The Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Art. The geometric work of the Greeks, typified
in the Elements, provided the framework for generalizing formulae beyond the solution of particular
problems into more general systems of stating and solving equations, though this would not be realized
until the medieval Muslim mathematicians.

The Hellenistic mathematicians Hero of Alexandria and Diophantus as well as Indian

mathematicians such as Brahmagupta continued the traditions of Egypt and Babylon, though
Diophantus' Arithmetica and Brahmagupta's Brahmasphutasiddhanta are on a higher level. For example,
the first complete arithmetic solution (including zero and negative solutions) to quadratic equations was
described by Brahmagupta in his book Brahmasphutasiddhanta. Later, Arabic and Muslim
mathematicians developed algebraic methods to a much higher degree of sophistication. Although
Diophantus and the Babylonians used mostly special ad hoc methods to solve equations, Al-Khwarizmi
was the first to solve equations using general methods. He solved the linear indeterminate equations,
quadratic equations, second order indeterminate equations and equations with multiple variable.

In 1545, the Italian mathematician Girolamo Cardano published Ars magna -The great art, a 40-
chapter masterpiece in which he gave for the first time a method for solving the general quartic equation.

The Greek mathematician Diophantus has traditionally been known as the "father of algebra" but
in more recent times there is much debate over whether al-Khwarizmi, who founded the discipline of al-
jabr, deserves that title instead. Those who support Diophantus point to the fact that the algebra found in
Al-Jabr is slightly more elementary than the algebra found in Arithmetica and that Arithmetica is
syncopated while Al-Jabr is fully rhetorical. Those who support Al-Khwarizmi point to the fact that he
introduced the methods of "reduction" and "balancing" (the transposition of subtracted terms to the other
side of an equation, that is, the cancellation of like terms on opposite sides of the equation) which the
term al-jabr originally referred to, and that he gave an exhaustive explanation of solving quadratic
equations, supported by geometric proofs, while treating algebra as an independent discipline in its own
right. His algebra was also no longer concerned "with a series of problems to be resolved, but an
exposition which starts with primitive terms in which the combinations must give all possible prototypes
for equations, which henceforward explicitly constitute the true object of study." He also studied an
equation for its own sake and "in a generic manner, insofar as it does not simply emerge in the course of
solving a problem, but is specifically called on to define an infinite class of problems."

The Persian mathematician Omar Khayyam is credited with identifying the foundations of
algebraic geometry and found the general geometric solution of the cubic equation. Another Persian
mathematician, Sharaf al-Dīn al-Tūsī, found algebraic and numerical solutions to various cases of cubic
equations. He also developed the concept of a function. The Indian mathematicians Mahavira and
Bhaskara II, the Persian mathematician Al-Karaji, and the Chinese mathematician Zhu Shijie, solved
various cases of cubic, quartic, quintic and higher-order polynomial equations using numerical methods.
In the 13th century, the solution of a cubic equation by Fibonacci is representative of the beginning of a
revival in European algebra. As the Islamic world was declining, the European world was ascending.
And it is here that Algebra was further developed.

François Viète’s work at the close of the 16th century marks the start of the classical discipline
of algebra. In 1637 René Descartes published La Géométrie, inventing analytic geometry and
introducing modern algebraic notation. Another key event in the further development of algebra was the
general algebraic solution of the cubic and quartic equations, developed in the mid-16th century. The
idea of a determinant was developed by Japanese mathematician Kowa Seki in the 17th century,
followed independently by Gottfried Leibniz ten years later, for the purpose of solving systems of
simultaneous linear equations using matrices. Gabriel Cramer also did some work on matrices and
determinants in the 18th century. Permutations were studied by Joseph Lagrange in his 1770 paper
Réflexions sur la résolution algébrique des équations devoted to solutions of algebraic equations, in
which he introduced Lagrange resolvents. Paolo Ruffini was the first person to develop the theory of
permutation groups, and like his predecessors, also in the context of solving algebraic equations.

Abstract algebra was developed in the 19th century, initially focusing on what is now called
Galois theory, and on constructibility issues. The "modern algebra" has deep nineteenth-century roots in
the work, for example, of Richard Dedekind and Leopold Kronecker and profound interconnections with
other branches of mathematics such as algebraic number theory and algebraic geometry. George
Peacock was the founder of axiomatic thinking in arithmetic and algebra. Augustus De Morgan
discovered relation algebra in his Syllabus of a Proposed System of Logic. Josiah Willard Gibbs
developed an algebra of vectors in three-dimensional space, and Arthur Cayley developed an algebra of
matrices (this is a non-commutative algebra).

Algebra may be divided roughly into the following categories:

• Elementary algebra, in which the properties of operations on the real number system are
recorded using symbols as "place holders" to denote constants and variables, and the rules
governing mathematical expressions and equations involving these symbols are studied. This is
usually taught at school under the title algebra (or intermediate algebra and college algebra in
subsequent years). University-level courses in group theory may also be called elementary
algebra.
• Abstract algebra, sometimes also called modern algebra, in which algebraic structures such as
groups, rings and fields are axiomatically defined and investigated.
• Linear algebra, in which the specific properties of vector spaces are studied (including
matrices);
• Universal algebra, in which properties common to all algebraic structures are studied.
• Algebraic number theory, in which the properties of numbers are studied through algebraic
systems. Number theory inspired much of the original abstraction in algebra.
• Algebraic geometry applies abstract algebra to the problems of geometry.
• Algebraic combinatorics, in which abstract algebraic methods are used to study combinatorial
questions.

Analysis
Analysis, which mathematicians refer to simply as analysis, has its beginnings in the rigorous
formulation of calculus. It is the branch of pure mathematics most explicitly concerned with the notion
of a limit, whether the limit of a sequence or the limit of a function. It also includes the theories of
differentiation, integration and measure, infinite series, and analytic functions. These theories are often
studied in the context of real numbers, complex numbers, and real and complex functions. However,
they can also be defined and studied in any space of mathematical objects that has a definition of
nearness (a topological space) or, more specifically, distance (a metric space).
History of Analysis
Early results in analysis were implicitly present in the early days of ancient Greek mathematics.
For instance, an infinite geometric sum is implicit in Zeno's paradox of the dichotomy. Later, Greek
mathematicians such as Eudoxus and Archimedes made more explicit, but informal, use of the concepts
of limits and convergence when they used the method of exhaustion to compute the area and volume of
regions and solids. In India, the 12th century mathematician Bhāskara II gave examples of the derivative
and used what is now known as Rolle's theorem.

In the 14th century, Madhava of Sangamagrama developed infinite series expansions, like the
power series and the Taylor series, of functions such as sine, cosine, tangent and arctangent. Alongside
his development of the Taylor series of the trigonometric functions, he also estimated the magnitude of
the error terms created by truncating these series and gave a rational approximation of an infinite series.
His followers at the Kerala school of astronomy and mathematics further expanded his works, up to the
16th century.

In Europe, during the later half of the 17th century, Newton and Leibniz independently
developed calculus, which grew, with the stimulus of applied work that continued through the
18th century, into analysis topics such as the calculus of variations, ordinary and partial differential
equations, Fourier analysis, and generating functions. During this period, calculus techniques were
applied to approximate discrete problems by continuous ones.

In the 18th century, Euler introduced the notion of mathematical function. Real analysis began to
emerge as an independent subject when Bernard Bolzano introduced the modern definition of continuity
in 1816. In the 19th century, Cauchy helped to put calculus on a firm logical foundation by introducing
the concept of the Cauchy sequence. He also started the formal theory of complex analysis. Poisson,
Liouville, Fourier and others studied partial differential equations and harmonic analysis. The
contributions of these mathematicians and others, such as Weierstrass, developed the modern notion of
mathematical rigor, thus founding the field of mathematical analysis (at least in the modern sense).

In the middle of the century Riemann introduced his theory of integration. The last third of the
19th century saw the arithmetization of analysis by Weierstrass, who thought that geometric reasoning
was inherently misleading, and introduced the "epsilon-delta" definition of limit. Then, mathematicians
started worrying that they were assuming the existence of a continuum of real numbers without proof.
Dedekind then constructed the real numbers by Dedekind cuts, in which a mathematician creates
irrational numbers that serve to fill the "gaps" between rational numbers, thereby creating a complete
set: the continuum of real numbers. Around that time, the attempts to refine the theorems of Riemann
integration led to the study of the "size" of the set of discontinuities of real functions.

Also, "monsters" (nowhere continuous functions, continuous but nowhere differentiable

functions, space-filling curves) began to be created. In this context, Jordan developed his theory of
measure, Cantor developed what is now called naive set theory, and Baire proved the Baire category
theorem. In the early 20th century, calculus was formalized using an axiomatic set theory. Lebesgue
solved the problem of measure, and Hilbert introduced Hilbert spaces to solve integral equations. The
idea of normed vector space was in the air, and in the 1920s Banach created functional analysis.
Geometry
Geometry (Ancient Greek: γεωμετρία; geo- "earth", -metri "measurement") "Earth-measuring"
is a part of mathematics concerned with questions of size, shape, relative position of figures, and the
properties of space. Geometry is one of the oldest sciences. Initially a body of practical knowledge
concerning lengths, areas, and volumes, in the 3rd century BC geometry was put into an axiomatic form
by Euclid, whose treatment—Euclidean geometry—set a standard for many centuries to follow. The
field of astronomy, especially mapping the positions of the stars and planets on the celestial sphere,
served as an important source of geometric problems during the next one and a half millennia. A
mathematician who works in the field of geometry is called a geometer.

The introduction of coordinates by René Descartes and the concurrent development of algebra
marked a new stage for geometry, since geometric figures, such as plane curves, could now be
represented analytically, i.e., with functions and equations. This played a key role in the emergence of
calculus in the 17th century. Furthermore, the theory of perspective showed that there is more to
geometry than just the metric properties of figures: perspective is the origin of projective geometry. The
subject of geometry was further enriched by the study of intrinsic structure of geometric objects that
originated with Euler and Gauss and led to the creation of topology and differential geometry.

In Euclid's time there was no clear distinction between physical space and geometrical space.
Since the 19th-century discovery of non-Euclidean geometry, the concept of space has undergone a
radical transformation, and the question arose which geometrical space best fits physical space. With the
rise of formal mathematics in the 20th century, also 'space' (and 'point', 'line', 'plane') lost its intuitive
contents, so today we have to distinguish between physical space, geometrical spaces (in which 'space',
'point' etc. still have their intuitive meaning) and abstract spaces. Contemporary geometry considers
manifolds, spaces that are considerably more abstract than the familiar Euclidean space, which they only
approximately resemble at small scales. These spaces may be endowed with additional structure,
allowing one to speak about length. Modern geometry has multiple strong bonds with physics,
exemplified by the ties between pseudo-Riemannian geometry and general relativity. One of the
youngest physical theories, string theory, is also very geometric in flavor.

While the visual nature of geometry makes it initially more accessible than other parts of
mathematics, such as algebra or number theory, geometric language is also used in contexts far removed
from its traditional, Euclidean provenance (for example, in fractal geometry and algebraic geometry).
History of Geometry
The earliest recorded beginnings of geometry can be traced to ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and
the Indus Valley from around 3000 BCE. Early geometry was a collection of empirically discovered
principles concerning lengths, angles, areas, and volumes, which were developed to meet some practical
need in surveying, construction, astronomy, and various crafts. The earliest known texts on geometry are
the Egyptian Rhind Papyrus and Moscow Papyrus, the Babylonian clay tablets, and the Indian Shulba
Sutras, while the Chinese had the work of Mozi, Zhang Heng, and the Nine Chapters on the
Mathematical Art, edited by Liu Hui.Euclid's Elements (c. 300 BCE) was one of the most important
early texts on geometry, in which he presented geometry in an ideal axiomatic form, which came to be
known as Euclidean geometry. The treatise is not, as is sometimes thought, a compendium of all that
Hellenistic mathematicians knew about geometry at that time; rather, it is an elementary introduction to
it; Euclid himself wrote eight more advanced books on geometry. We know from other references that
Euclid’s was not the first elementary geometry textbook, but the others fell into disuse and were lost.
[citation needed]

In the Middle Ages, mathematics in medieval Islam contributed to the development of geometry,
especially algebraic geometry and geometric algebra. Al-Mahani (b. 853) conceived the idea of reducing
geometrical problems such as duplicating the cube to problems in algebra. Thābit ibn Qurra (known as
Thebit in Latin) (836-901) dealt with arithmetical operations applied to ratios of geometrical quantities,
and contributed to the development of analytic geometry. Omar Khayyám (1048–1131) found geometric
solutions to cubic equations, and his extensive studies of the parallel postulate contributed to the
development of non-Euclidian geometry. The theorems of Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen), Omar Khayyam
and Nasir al-Din al-Tusi on quadrilaterals, including the Lambert quadrilateral and Saccheri
quadrilateral, were the first theorems on elliptical geometry and hyperbolic geometry, and along with
their alternative postulates, such as Playfair's axiom, these works had a considerable influence on the
development of non-Euclidean geometry among later European geometers, including Witelo, Levi ben
Gerson, Alfonso, John Wallis, and Giovanni Girolamo Saccheri.

In the early 17th century, there were two important developments in geometry. The first, and
most important, was the creation of analytic geometry, or geometry with coordinates and equations, by
René Descartes (1596–1650) and Pierre de Fermat (1601–1665). This was a necessary precursor to the
development of calculus and a precise quantitative science of physics. The second geometric
development of this period was the systematic study of projective geometry by Girard Desargues (1591–
1661). Projective geometry is the study of geometry without measurement, just the study of how points
align with each other.

Two developments in geometry in the 19th century changed the way it had been studied
previously. These were the discovery of non-Euclidean geometries by Lobachevsky, Bolyai and Gauss
and of the formulation of symmetry as the central consideration in the Erlangen Programme of Felix
Klein (which generalized the Euclidean and non Euclidean geometries). Two of the master geometers of
the time were Bernhard Riemann, working primarily with tools from mathematical analysis, and
introducing the Riemann surface, and Henri Poincaré, the founder of algebraic topology and the
geometric theory of dynamical systems. As a consequence of these major changes in the conception of
geometry, the concept of "space" became something rich and varied, and the natural background for
theories as different as complex analysis and classical mechanics.
 Applied mathematics
Applied mathematics is a branch of mathematics that concerns itself with the mathematical
techniques typically used in the application of mathematical knowledge to other domains.

There is no consensus as to what the various branches of applied mathematics are. Such categorizations
are made difficult by the way mathematics and science change over time, and also by the way
universities organize departments, courses, and degrees.

Historically, applied mathematics consisted principally of applied analysis, most notably differential
equations; approximation theory (broadly construed, to include representations, asymptotic methods,
variational methods, and numerical analysis); and applied probability. These areas of mathematics were
intimately tied to the development of Newtonian physics, and in fact the distinction between
mathematicians and physicists was not sharply drawn before the mid-19th century. This history left a
legacy as well: until the early 20th century subjects such as classical mechanics were often taught in
applied mathematics departments at American universities rather than in physics departments, and fluid
mechanics may still be taught in applied mathematics departments.[1] As well as physics, engineering
and computer science have traditionally made use of applied mathematics.

Today, the term applied mathematics is used in a broader sense. It includes the classical areas above, as
well as other areas that have become increasingly important in applications. Even fields such as number
theory that are part of pure mathematics are now important in applications (such as cryptography),
though they are not generally considered to be part of the field of applied mathematics per se.
Sometimes the term applicable mathematics is used to distinguish between the traditional applied
mathematics that developed alongside physics and the many areas of mathematics that are applicable to
real-world problems today.

Many mathematicians distinguish between applied mathematics, which is concerned with mathematical
methods, and the applications of mathematics within science and engineering. A biologist using a
population model and applying known mathematics would not be doing applied mathematics, but rather
using it; however mathematical biologists have posed problems that have stimulated the growth of pure
mathematics. However, mathematicians like Poincaré and Arnold deny the existence of "applied
mathematics" and claim that there are only "applications of mathematics"; similarly, nonmathematicians
blend applied mathematics and applications of mathematics. The use and development of mathematics
to solve industrial problems is also called industrial mathematics.[2]

The success of modern numerical mathematical methods and software has led to the emergence of
computational mathematics, computational science, and computational engineering, which use high
performance computing for the simulation of phenomena and the solution of problems in the sciences
and engineering. These are often considered interdisciplinary disciplines.

3. What is the difference between Applied Math and Pure Math? Δ

Some people enjoy mathematics for its own sake. They appreciate the logical foundations, the precise
formulation of the concepts and the rigorous justification of the results (proofs). They see beauty in the
abstract structure of mathematics. Such people will enjoy Pure Mathematics.

On the other hand, some people enjoy seeing how math can be used to solve problems in the real world.
They are attracted by the challenge of determining what mathematical tools are appropriate for a
particular application and possibly inventing new tools. They appreciate seeing how diverse physical
phenomena can have a similar mathematical description. Such people will enjoy Applied Mathematics.

These differences do not mean that there will be no mention of applications in PMATH courses, or that
you won't see any proofs in AMATH courses! The difference lies in the extent to which applications and
proofs are emphasized.