William Burnside

Personal life
William Burnside (July 2, 1852 - August 21, 1927) was a British group theorist.

Professional life

 * Schooling: St. John's and Permbroke's colleges in Cambridge University, where he was second Wrangler in 1875
 * 1875 - 1885: Lectured at Cambridge
 * 1885 onwards: Professor at Royal Naval College, Greenwich

Finite groups
Burnside, often competing with his contemporary Frobenius, proved basic results in the use of linear representations for studying the structure of finite groups. His most notable result is probably Burnside's p^aq^b theorem.

He also studied the Burnside problem which asks questions about the structure of Burnside groups.

Terms

 * Burnside group

Results

 * Burnside's p^aq^b theorem

Questions

 * Burnside problem