Peter Ludwig Mejdell Sylow

Personal details
Peter Ludwig Mejdell Sylow (12 December 1832 - 7 September 1918) was a Norwegian mathematician who worked in group theory. He was born and died at Christiana (Oslo).

Professional details

 * 1858 - 1862: School teacher in Frederickshald
 * 1862: Substitute lecturer in Christiana University

Sylow's theorems
While a substitute lecturer at Christiana University, Sylow posed some questions that led to the notion of Sylow subgroup. In 1872, he published a paper describing the Sylow's theorems, which state that for any finite group $$G$$:


 * There exist $$p$$-Sylow subgroups for any $$p$$ dividing the order of $$G$$
 * The $$p$$-Sylow subgroups are all conjugate and the number of such subgroups is 1 modulo $$p$$
 * Any $$p$$-subgroup is contained in a $$p$$-Sylow subgroup

Editing work
Along with Sophus Lie, Sylow worked on editing the papers of of Abel.

Terminology after this person

 * Sylow subgroup
 * Sylow's theorem
 * Sylow intersection