Sergei Nikolaevich Chernikov
Sergei Nikolaevich Chernikov (11 May 1912 – 23 January 1987; ) was a Russian mathematician who contributed significantly to the development of infinite group theory and linear inequalities. Biography. Chernikov was born on 11 May 1912 in Sergiyev Posad, in Moscow Oblast, Russia, to Nikolai Nikolaevich, a priest, and Anna Alekseevna, a housewife. After graduating from secondary school, he worked as a labourer, as a driver, as a book-keeper and as an accountant. Until November 1931 he taught mathematics in a school for workers. From 1930 he was an external student of the Pedagogic Institute of Saratov State  University, where he graduated in 1933. He began graduate studies at the Ural Industrial Institute under the outside tutelage of Alexandr G. Kurosh (of the University of Moscow). A remarkable student, Chernikov was made head of the Ural Mathematics department (1939–1946) immediately after earning his PhD in 1938, even before defending his DSc in 1940. He went on to be head of mathematical departments at Ural State University (1946–1951), Perm State University (1951–1961), the Steklov Institute of Mathematics (1961–1964), and finally the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine from 1964 until days before his death in 1987. During his career , he trained more than 40 PhD and 7 DSc students, and published dozens of papers that remained influential 100 years after his birth. Contributions. Chernikov is credited with introducing a number of fundamental concepts to group theory, including the locally finite group, and nilpotent group. As with many of his other contributions, these allow infinite groups to be partially or locally solved, establishing important early links between finite and infinite group theories. Later in his career, he was hailed as "one of the pioneers of linear programming", for his breakthrough algebraic theory of linear inequalities.