| Jean-Pierre Demailly | |
| Birth Date: | 25 September 1957 |
| Birth Place: | Péronne, France |
| Death Place: | France |
| Nationality: | French |
| Fields: | Mathematics |
| Workplaces: | Université Grenoble Alpes |
| Alma Mater: | École Normale Supérieure Paris Diderot University Pierre and Marie Curie University |
| Thesis Title: | Sur différents aspects de la positivité en analyse complexe |
| Thesis Year: | 1982 |
| Doctoral Advisor: | Henri Skoda |
Jean-Pierre Demailly (25 September 1957 – 17 March 2022) was a French mathematician who worked in complex geometry. He was a professor at Université Grenoble Alpes and a permanent member of the French Academy of Sciences.
Demailly was born on 25 September 1957 in Péronne, France.[1] He attended the Lycée de Péronne from 1966 to 1973 and the Lycée Faidherbe from 1973 to 1975.[1] He entered the École Normale Supérieure in 1975, where he received his agrégation in 1977 and graduated in 1979.[2] During this time, he received an undergraduate licence degree from Paris Diderot University in 1976 and a diplôme d'études approfondies under Henri Skoda at the Pierre and Marie Curie University in 1979.[1] He received his Doctorat d'État in 1982 under the direction of Skoda at the Pierre and Marie Curie University, with thesis "Sur différents aspects de la positivité en analyse complexe".[2]
Demailly became a professor at Université Grenoble Alpes in 1983.[2] He served as the editor-in-chief of the Annales de l'Institut Fourier from 1998 to 2006 and the editor-in-chief of Comptes Rendus Mathématique from 2010 to 2015.[2] He was also an editor for Inventiones Mathematicae from 1997 to 2002.[2]
He was the director of the Institut Fourier from 2003 to 2006.[2] From June 2003 onwards, he led the Groupe de réflexion interdisciplinaire sur les programmes (GRIP), which ran experimental classes in primary schools.[2]
Demailly's mathematical works primarily concerned complex analytic geometry, using techniques from complex geometry with applications to algebraic geometry and number theory.[2] He also wrote and co-authored several Unix and Linux libraries starting in the 1990s, including xpaint, sunclock, and dmg2img.[2]
X
H1,1(X,\R)
Such analytic results have had many applications to algebraic geometry. In particular, Boucksom, Demailly, Păun, and Peternell showed that a smooth complex projective variety
X
KX
For a singular metric on a line bundle, Nadel, Demailly, and Yum-Tong Siu developed the concept of the multiplier ideal, which describes where the metric is most singular. There is an analog of the Kodaira vanishing theorem for such a metric, on compact or noncompact complex manifolds.[5] This led to the first effective criteria for a line bundle on a complex projective variety
X
n
X
2KX+12nnL
Demailly used the technique of jet differentials introduced by Green and Phillip Griffiths to prove Kobayashi hyperbolicity for various projective varieties. For example, Demailly and El Goul showed that a very general complex surface
X
CP3
\Complex\toX
X
\Complex\toX
Demailly received the CNRS Bronze Medal in 1981,[2] the from the French Academy of Sciences in 1994,[2] [9] the Humboldt Prize in 1996,[2] the Simion Stoilow Prize from the Romanian Academy of Sciences in 2006,[2] the Stefan Bergman Prize from the American Mathematical Society in 2015,[2] [10] and the Heinz Hopf Prize from ETH in 2021.[11]
Demailly was elected a correspondent of the French Academy of Sciences in 1994 and then became a permanent member in 2007.[2] [12] He was an invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in 1994 and a plenary speaker in 2006.[13]
Demailly died on 17 March 2022.[14]
L2
\bar\partial