Douglas Ravenel
American mathematician
Douglas Conner Ravenel (born February 17, 1947) is an American mathematician known for work in algebraic topology.
Life
Ravenel received his PhD from Brandeis University in 1972 under the direction of Edgar H. Brown, Jr. with a thesis on exotic characteristic classes of spherical fibrations. From 1971 to 1973 he was a C. L. E. Moore instructor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and in 1974/75 he visited the Institute for Advanced Study. He became an assistant professor at Columbia University in 1973 and at the University of Washington in Seattle in 1976, where he was promoted to associate professor in 1978 and professor in 1981. From 1977 to 1979 he was a Sloan Fellow. Since 1988 he has been a professor at the University of Rochester. He was an invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Helsinki, 1978, and is an editor of The New York Journal of Mathematics since 1994.
In 2012 he became a fellow of the American Mathematical Society. In 2022 he received the Oswald Veblen Prize in Geometry.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Douglas Ravenel” is american mathematician. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Douglas, Ravenel and American, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “american mathematician” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q994334. VIAF identifies the subject as 29594972. The Library of Congress control number is n85027858. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1947, 1972, 1971 and 1973.
A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.
- Establishing names and roles
- Building a first chronology
- Locating cited institutions
Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Douglas Ravenel”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Douglas Ravenel primary sources, Douglas Ravenel archive and Douglas research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Douglas Ravenel”?
- How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
- Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Douglas Ravenel” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.