31/05/2023

Folha: The importance of Silva Dias to the IMPA library

Reproduction of Marcelo Viana's column in Folha de S. Paulo.

Cândido da Silva Dias is one of the pioneers of mathematical research in Brazil. Born in 1913, at the age of 24 he became one of the first graduates in mathematics from the then newly created Faculty of Philosophy, Sciences and Letters ( FFCL ) of the University of São Paulo (USP). Five years later, he defended the first doctoral thesis in science at the FFCL.

His most important scientific work, "Topological Vector Spaces and their Application to Analytic Functional Spaces," was published in 1950. Related results were obtained simultaneously by mathematicians Alexander Grothendieck (winner of the Fields Medal in 1966) in France, Gottfried Köthe in Germany, and José Sebastião e Silva in Portugal, which clearly demonstrates the relevance of the topic in research at the time.

In 1945, Silva Dias participated in the creation of the São Paulo Mathematical Society, a precursor to the Brazilian Mathematical Society. In the 1960s, he led the creation of the Institute for Mathematical Research at USP—now the Institute of Mathematics and Statistics—of which he was the first director, between 1970 and 1974. Years earlier, in 1951-1952, he had played a central role in the creation of the Institute of Pure and Applied Mathematics (IMPA) in Rio de Janeiro, an institution with which he maintained a close relationship throughout his life.

His son, Pedro Leite da Silva Dias, one of Brazil's leading experts in meteorology, recalls that his father always spoke of IMPA with great affection and remembers his conversations with his friends Leopoldo Nachbin and Mauricio Peixoto, the institute's first researchers: "I lived through some of those episodes and I still remember when, as a child, I traveled with my father to Rio de Janeiro. But the best memory is of the conversations he had with Leopoldo and Mauricio in the living room, at home, on Vergueiro Street. They would spend hours and hours chatting. I remember falling asleep on the sofa listening to their conversation and laughter. Obviously, I didn't understand anything, but I found it so interesting!"

Silva Dias would make yet another invaluable contribution to IMPA. It so happened that, shortly after the institute's creation, CNPq allocated approximately US$2,000 for the acquisition of a specialized library. This money was given to Silva Dias, who was about to leave for an internship in France and, as was well known, was knowledgeable in the subject.