George William Hill

George William Hill
Portrait of George William Hill
George William Hill
Born(1838-03-03)March 3, 1838
DiedApril 16, 1914(1914-04-16) (aged 76)
West Nyack, New York, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Alma materRutgers University
Known for
Awards
Scientific career
FieldsAstronomy, mathematics
InstitutionsColumbia University, United States Naval Observatory
Academic advisorsTheodore Strong
Signature
Hill's signature

George William Hill (March 3, 1838 – April 16, 1914) was an American astronomer and mathematician. Working independently and largely in isolation from the wider scientific community, he made major contributions to celestial mechanics and to the theory of ordinary differential equations. The importance of his work was explicitly acknowledged by Henri Poincaré in 1905. In 1909 Hill was awarded the Royal Society's Copley Medal, "on the ground of his researches in mathematical astronomy". Hill is remembered for the Hill differential equation, along with the Hill sphere.