- journal article metadata
European Mathematical Society Publishing House
2016-09-19 17:04:57
Elemente der Mathematik
Elem. Math.
EM
0013-6018
1420-8962
General
10.4171/EM
http://www.ems-ph.org/doi/10.4171/EM
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European Mathematical Society Publishing House
Zuerich, Switzerland
© Swiss Mathematical Society
71
2016
2
Hurwitz’s counting isomers of alkanes
Holger
Helmstetter
, WÜRZBURG, GERMANY
Nicola
Oswald
Bergische Universität Wuppertal, WUPPERTAL, GERMANY
Adolf Hurwitz, trees, counting chemical compounds
In a late entry in his mathematical diary from 1918 Adolf Hurwitz refined ideas due to Arthur Cayley in order to count trees of specific structure (namely isomers of alkanes). We shall analyze his reasoning in detail and discuss it in context with Cayley's original approach and George Pólya's later enumeration method.
History and biography
Combinatorics
57
68
10.4171/EM/300
http://www.ems-ph.org/doi/10.4171/EM/300