Barbara Gertrude Yates
Barbara Gertrude Yates (1919-1998) was an Irish mathematician who seems to have been the first woman born and brought up in Ireland to gain a PhD in pure mathematics.[1][2]
Life and career
She was born in January 1919 in Dublin, to a family with a tradition of excelling in mathematics at Trinity College Dublin. Her Offaly-born father James Yates (1869-1929) had been a Trinity Scholar in Mathematics prior to his graduation in 1891, and was a school inspector in various parts of Ireland until 1922, when the whole family moved to Belfast following the partition of Ireland. Her older brothers Henry George Yates (1908-1954) and James Garrett Yates (1917-1957) had also been Trinity Scholars in Mathematics, in 1927 and 1936 respectively.[3] She herself received that distinction in 1940, graduating BA in mathematics in 1941.[3]
She was on the teaching staff at Queens University Belfast 1942-1945, then at the University of Aberdeen 1945-1948, following which she moved to Royal Holloway College, where she lectured until her retirement at age 65.[4] In 1952 she completed her PhD, awarded the following year by the University of Aberdeen, with a thesis entitled "A difference-differential equation". Her advisor was E. M. Wright.[5]
References
- ^ The First Irish Woman with a Doctorate in Maths Mathematics Ireland
- ^ The first woman born and brought up in Ireland to get a PhD in mathematical science–as opposed to pure mathematics–was Sheila Tinney, in 1941.
- ^ a b "List of Scholars". TCD Life.
- ^ Proceedings of the International Congress of Mathematicians, 1954 by Johan Gerretsen and Johannes de Groot; Erven P. Noordhoff N.V., Groningen North-Holland Publishing Co., Amsterdam 1957.
- ^ The Linear Difference-Differential Equation With Linear Coefficients By Barbara G. Yates, Royal Holloway College, University Of London
External links
- 20th-century Irish people
- Irish women mathematicians
- Alumni of Trinity College, Dublin
- Scholars of Trinity College, Dublin
- Alumni of the University of Aberdeen
- Academics of Queen's University Belfast
- Academics of the University of Aberdeen
- Academics of Royal Holloway, University of London
- 1919 births
- 1998 deaths