Moritz Abraham Stern

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Moritz Abraham Stern
Moritz Abraham Stern.jpg
Born (1807-06-29)29 June 1807
Died 30 January 1894(1894-01-30) (aged 86)
Fields Mathematics
Institutions University of Göttingen
Doctoral advisor Bernhard Friedrich Thibaut
Carl Friedrich Gauss
Notable students Bernhard Riemann
Ferdinand Eisenstein
Known for Stern primes
Stern–Brocot tree

Moritz Abraham Stern (29 June 1807 – 30 January 1894) was a German mathematician. Stern became Ordinarius (full professor) at Göttingen University in 1858, succeeding Carl Friedrich Gauss. Stern was the first Jewish full professor at a German university.[1]

As a professor Stern taught Bernhard Riemann along with Gauss. Stern was also very helpful to Ferdinand Eisenstein in formulating a proof of the quadratic reciprocity theorem. Stern was interested in primes that cannot be expressed as the sum of a prime and twice a square (now known as Stern primes).

He is known for formulating Stern's diatomic series[2]

1, 1, 2, 1, 3, 2, 3, 1, 4, … (sequence A002487 in OEIS)

that counts the number of ways to write a number as a sum of powers of two with no power used more than twice.

He is also known for the Stern–Brocot tree which he wrote about in 1858 and which Brocot independently discovered in 1861.


  1. ^ Setting the record straight about Jewish mathematicians in Nazi Germany, Haaretz
  2. ^ Stern, M. A. (1858), "Ueber eine zahlentheoretische Funktion", Journal für die reine und angewandte Mathematik 55: 193–220 .

External links[edit]

This article incorporates material from Moritz Stern on PlanetMath, which is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.