Mildred Leonora Sanderson (May 12, 1889 – October 10, 1914) was an American mathematician, best known for her mathematical theorem concerning modular invariants.[1][2]

Mildred Leonora Sanderson
Born(1889-05-12)May 12, 1889
DiedOctober 15, 1914(1914-10-15) (aged 25)
Resting placeMount Feake Cemetery, Waltham
Scientific career
FieldsMathematics
ThesisFormal modular invariants with application to binary modular covariants (1913)
Doctoral advisorLeonard Eugene Dickson

Life

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Sanderson was born in Waltham, Massachusetts, in 1889 and was the valedictorian of her class at the Waltham High School.[1] She graduated from Mount Holyoke College in 1910, winning Senior Honors in Mathematics.[1] She obtained her Ph.D degree from the University of Chicago in 1913,[3] publishing the thesis (Sanderson 1913) in which she set forth her mathematical theorem. She was Leonard Eugene Dickson's first female doctoral student.[1][3]

After completing her Ph.D., Sanderson briefly taught at the University of Wisconsin before her untimely death in 1914 due to tuberculosis.[1][4]

Sanderson's theorem

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Sanderson family grave at Mount Feake Cemetery, Waltham, Massachusetts. The grave of Mildred Sanderson is behind the main marker.

Sanderson's theorem (Sanderson 1913, p.490) states: "To any modular invariant   of a system of forms under any group   of linear transformations with coefficients in the field  , there corresponds a formal invariant   under   such that   for all sets of values in the field of the coefficients of the system of forms." Often this theorem was cited as “Miss Sanderson’s Theorem”.[1]

Recognition

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She is mentioned in the 2008 book Pioneering women in American mathematics: the pre-1940 PhD's, by Judy Green and Jeanne LaDuke.[4]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e f "Mildred Leonora Sanderson". www.agnesscott.edu. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
  2. ^ Rutherford (2007, p.39)
  3. ^ a b Mildred Sanderson at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
  4. ^ a b Green, Judy; LaDuke, Jeanne (2008). Pioneering Women in American Mathematics — The Pre-1940 PhD's. History of Mathematics. Vol. 34 (1st ed.). American Mathematical Society, The London Mathematical Society. ISBN 978-0-8218-4376-5. Biography on p.542-543 of the Supplementary Material at AMS