Eberhard Becker

Eberhard Becker (born July 23, 1943, in Stavenhagen) is a German mathematician whose career was spent at the University of Dortmund. A very active researcher in algebra, he later became rector of the university there. During his term as rector, it was renamed the Technical University of Dortmund.

Education and career Becker received his Ph.D. at the University of Hamburg in 1972 with the dissertation, "Contributions to the theory of semi-simple quadratic algebra" under advisor Hel Braun. He completed his habilitation at the University of Cologne in 1976. In 1979 Becker was appointed to the mathematics department at the University of Dortmund. He supervised over a dozen doctoral students, including Markus Schweighofer, Susanne Pumplün, and Thorsten Wörmann. He offered a bottle of champaign to anyone who could find explicit representations of this form. Bruce Reznick came up with a solution in 1994.

After working as institute director, dean and member of the Senate at the University of Dortmund, Becker became rector there on April 30, 2002 following the resignation of Hans-Jürgen Klein.