Jean-Pierre Serre is a French mathematician born in 1926 who has made significant contributions to algebraic topology through his work with spectral sequences and their application to studying relations between homology and homotopy groups. He was educated in France and has held positions at several prestigious universities. Serre has received numerous honors and awards for his influential research throughout his career.

1. Jean-Pierre Serre TaylerShotts

2. Background Born in 1926 in France. He was awarded his doctorate in 1951. Serre was educated at the Lycée de Nîmes. In 1954 Serre went to the University of Nancy where he worked until 1956. From 1956 he held the chair of Algebra and Geometry in the Collège de France until he retired in 1994. He then became an honorary professor. He made research visits at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton and at Harvard University

3. BAckground Serre's early work was on spectral sequences. A spectral sequence is an algebraic construction like an exact sequence, but more difficult to describe. Serre has received numerous awards. He has been awarded honorary degrees from the University of Cambridge in 1978, the University of Stockholm in 1980, the University of Glasgow in 1983, the University of Harvard in 1998 and the University of Oslo in 2002.

4. Contribution Serre applied spectral sequences to the study of the relations between the homology groups of fibre, total space and base space in a fibration. This enabled him to discover fundamental connections between the homology groups and homotopy groups of a space and to prove important results on the homotopy groups of spheres.

5. Works cited http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Pierre_Serre http://www.gap-system.org/~history/Biographies/Serre.html http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/535878/Jean-Pierre-Serre http://www.s9.com/Biography/Serre-Jean-Pierre