Contributions of Leonhard Euler To Mathematics - Number Theory

Number Theory

Euler's great interest in number theory can be traced to the influence of his friend in the St. Peterburg Academy, Christian Goldbach. A lot of his early work on number theory was based on the works of Pierre de Fermat, and developed some of Fermat's ideas.

One focus of Euler's work was to link the nature of prime distribution with ideas in analysis. He proved that the sum of the reciprocals of the primes diverges. In doing so, he discovered the connection between Riemann zeta function and prime numbers, known as the Euler product formula for the Riemann zeta function.

Euler proved Newton's identities, Fermat's little theorem, Fermat's theorem on sums of two squares, and made distinct contributions to the Lagrange's four-square theorem. He also invented the totient function φ(n) which assigns to a positive integer n the number of positive integers less than n and coprime to n. Using properties of this function he was able to generalize Fermat's little theorem to what would become known as Euler's theorem. He further contributed significantly to the understanding of perfect numbers, which had fascinated mathematicians since Euclid. Euler made progress toward the prime number theorem and conjectured the law of quadratic reciprocity. The two concepts are regarded as the fundamental theorems of number theory, and his ideas paved the way for Carl Friedrich Gauss.