Oscar Zariski

…work of the American mathematician Oscar Zariski, who had studied with the Italian school of algebraic geometers but came to feel that their method of working was imprecise. He worked out a detailed program whereby every kind of geometric configuration could be redescribed in algebraic terms. His work succeeded in…

…the latter he studied under Oscar Zariski. Hironaka held an appointment at Columbia University, New York City, from 1964 to 1968, when he began teaching at Harvard. In 1975 he accepted a joint professorship at Kyōto. In addition, from 1996 to 2002 he was president of Yamaguchi University.

He continued the efforts of Oscar Zariski in making both algebraic and rigorous the work of the Italian school of algebraic geometers on the subject of algebraic surfaces. He was influential in bringing Grothendieck’s ideas to the United States, where they prospered. He also contributed to the development of an…