Gauss, Karl Friedrich. Born in 1777. German mathematician and astronomer. Patronized by the Duke of Brunswick, who defrayed the expenses of his education at Brunswick and Gottingen, where in 1801 Gauss produced "Disquisitiones Arithmeticae." In 1807 Gauss became professor and director of the observatory at Gottingen, and held the position until his death in 1855. During this period, he brought out many works on pure mathematics, astronomy, and other sciences, among which the chief are "Theoria Motus Corporum Coelestium, in Sectionibus Conicis Ambientium," "Recherches sur la Geodesie Superieure," and invented the heliotrope.

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