Anna Johnson and Her Seminal Theorem of 1917

Alkiviadis Akritas

Alkiviadis Akritas University of Thessaly Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Volos, Greece

Keywords: Euclidean polynomial remainder sequence (prs),, modified Euclidean prs, subresultant prs, modified subresultant prs, Van Vleck’s method, Sturm’s prs

Abstract

In this article we present the life of Anna Johnson, a woman exceptionally gifted in Mathematics, along with what we consider her greatest contribution: to wit, the theorem of 1917 on modified Euclidean polynomial remainder sequences (prs's), which laid the foundations of the theory of subresultant prs's. To demonstrate the various mathematical concepts presented in this article we use the mverbatim{python} based computer algebra system mverbatim (version 1.0), which is freely available.

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