Mathematicians -- B

Charles Babbage (1792-1871)

Born in England.
He is considered the creator of modern computers.
He wrote several papers on the calculus of functions for the Royal Society of London.
Jacob Bernoulli (1654-1705)

Born in Switzerland.
He made important contributions to the calculus, to the infinite series, and to probability.
Johann Bernoulli (1667-1748)

Born in Switzerland.
He developed the theorem of the divergence of the harmonic series.
He solved the brachistrochrone problem, which involves the rolling of a ball in the shortest time.
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius (475-526)

Born in Rome.
The teaching of early medieval mathematics was founded mainly on his geometry and arithmetic.
János Bolyai (1802-1860)

Born in Hungary.
He introduced a formula which later became known as the space constant.
Rafaello Bombelli (1526-1572)

Born in Italy.
He showed that in the irreducible case of a cubic equation the roots are all real.
George Boole (1815-1864)

Born in England.
He was the founder of the modern science of mathematical logic.
He devised a system of binary algebra that has implications for computer circuits and telephone switching.
He made contributions to probability theory, differential equations, and the calculus of finite differences.
Brahmagupta (598-668)

Born in India.
He found solutions in integers of several indeterminant equations of the first degree.
He proved the Pythagorean property of a right-angled triangle.
He gave expressions for the area of a triangle and of a quadrilateral inscribable in a circle in terms of their sides.
He showed that the area of a circle is equal to that of a rectangle whose sides were the radius and semiperimeter.
Henry Briggs (1561-1631)

Born in England.
He and John Napier jointly introduced, perfected, and exploited the concept of the logarithm.
He was instrumental in bringing into common use the method of long division that has since been used.