Edward Lindsay Ince
Prof Edward Lindsay Ince FRSE (1891–1941) was a British mathematician who worked on differential equations, especially those with period coefficients such as the Mathieu equation and the Lamé equation. He introduced the Ince equation, a generalization of the Mathieu equation.
Life
He was born in Amblecote in Worcestershire on 30 November 1891, the only son of Edward Ince, an Inland Revenue officer, and his wife, Caroline Clara Cutler. The family moved to Criccieth near Portmadoc in Wales soon after he was born.[1] His family moved to Perth in Scotland around 1901, living at 6 Queens Avenue in the Craigie district, to the south-west of the city.[2] He attended Perth Academy.[3]
He studied Mathematics at Edinburgh University from 1909 graduating in 1913. Failing the medical for the First World War he won a scholarship and went to Cambridge University where he graduated MA. Here he won the Smith's Prize in 1918. He then began lecturing in Mathematics at Leeds University. In 1920 he moved to Liverpool University.
He was elected to the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1923. His proposers were Sir Edmund Taylor Whittaker, David Gibb, Arthur Crichton Mitchell and Ralph Allan Sampson. The Society awarded him the Makdougall Brisbane Prize for 1938–1940 for his work on periodic Lamé functions (Ince 1940a, 1940b) but he died before he received the award.[4]
In 1926 he made a dramatic move, and accepted a professorship at the Egyptian University in Cairo. With a young family, and health problems arising from the extreme heat, he returned to Britain in 1931 to take a post at Edinburgh University for one year then spent two years at Imperial College, London before returning to Edinburgh permanently in 1935.
He died in Edinburgh on 16 March 1941.
Family
In 1923 he married Phyllis Fry. They had two daughters.
Publications
- Ince, E. L. (1915), A course in descriptive geometry and photogrammetry for the mathematical laboratory, Edinburgh mathematical tracts, G. Bell & Sons, Limited
- Ince, E. L. (1933), Principles of descriptive geometry, E. Arnold
- Ince, Edward L. (1939), Integration of Ordinary Differential Equations, Oliver and Boyd, Edinburgh, MR 0000325
- Ince, Edward L. (1940a), "The periodic Lamé functions", Proc. Roy. Soc. Edinburgh, 60: 47–63, MR 0002399
- Ince, Edward L. (1940b), "Further investigations into the periodic Lamé functions", Proc. Roy. Soc. Edinburgh, 60: 83–99, MR 0002400
- Ince, Edward L. (1944) [1926], Ordinary Differential Equations, Dover Publications, New York, ISBN 978-0-486-60349-0, MR 0010757
References
- ↑ http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/history/Biographies/Ince.html
- ↑ Perth Post Office Directory 1905–6
- ↑ BIOGRAPHICAL INDEX OF FORMER FELLOWS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH 1783 – 2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0 902 198 84 X.
- ↑ BIOGRAPHICAL INDEX OF FORMER FELLOWS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH 1783 – 2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0 902 198 84 X.
- Aitken, A. C. (1941), "Obituary: Dr. E. L. Ince", Nature. International Weekly Journal of Science, 148: 309.310, doi:10.1038/148309b0, ISSN 0028-0836
- O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Edward Lindsay Ince", MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews.
- Whittaker, E. T. (1941), "Obituary: Edward Lindsay Ince. 1891–1941", Journal of the London Mathematical Society. Second Series, 16: 139–144, doi:10.1112/jlms/s1-16.2.139, ISSN 0024-6107, MR 0005069
- Young, A. W. (1941), "Obituary: Edward Lindsay Ince, M.A., D.Sc., F.R.S.E", Proceedings of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society. Series II, 6: 263–264, ISSN 0013-0915, MR 0005070
- Young, A. W. (1942), "Edward Lindsay Ince, M.A., D.Sc.", Royal Society of Edinburgh Year Book: 18