About Sonia Kovalevsky

The day is named in honor of Sonia Kovalevsky. Sonia was a 19th century mathematician, advocate of women's rights and pioneer for women mathematicians around the world. She made valuable contributions to several fields in mathematics (analysis, partial differential equations, mechanics). Sonia was born January 15, 1850, in Moscow, Russia and died February 10, 1891, in Stockholm, Sweden.

 

Sonia Kovalevsky was the first woman in modern Europe to obtain a doctorate in mathematics, first woman to be appointed professor of mathematics, first woman to join the editorial board of a scientific journal, and first woman to be elected a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. She was also awarded the Prix Bordin of the French Academy of Sciences for a paper on the rotation of a solid body around a fixed point.