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Raoul Bott (1923-2005) was born in Budapest, but spent most of his life in the United States. His family emigrated to Canada in 1938. In his studies, he initially concentrated on electrical engineering, but then turned his attention to mathematics at the suggestion of one of his professors. After studying at McGill University in Canada, Bott attended Carnegie Mellon University in the USA, where he earned a PhD with a thesis on electrical networks. At the invitation of Hermann Weyl, he then moved to Princeton (Institute for Advanced Study), where he conducted research from 1949-1951 and 1955-1957. He taught at the University of Michigan between 1951 and 1959, and was a professor at Harvard University from 1959. In total, 26 students earned doctorates under his direction, with two of them (Smale 1966, Quillen 1978) also winning Fields Medals, the most prestigious award for mathematicians under the age of 40.
András Szenes was his only Hungarian doctoral student. In 2000, at the age of 77, he was awarded the Wolf Prize in mathematics for his discoveries in topology and differential geometry.
Front: The front of the coin shows a spatial representation of the differential geometry of a surface, alluding to Bott’s research in this f eld. The master mark of designer István Holló is located beneath the mint mark. The compulsory design elements: the inscription ‘MAGYARORSZÁG’, the value numerals ‘7500’, the mint mark ‘BP’ and the mint year ‘2023’ are also on the obverse.
Back: The back of the coin bears a portrait of the mathematician in his latter years, with the Bott periodicity theorem π n (0(∞))=π n+8 (0(∞)) next to it. The circular legend running around the top edge of the back reads “RAOUL BOTT” and “WOLF-DÍJ 2000” (Wolf Prize 2000), separated by a dot.
date of issue: 2023.03.24.
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