Sigve Tjøtta (born 1 March 1930) is a Norwegian
mathematician.
He was
born in Klepp
.
He took
the cand.real. degree in 1954 and the
dr.philos. degree in 1960, both at the
University of
Oslo
. His doctoral thesis was
On Some
Non-linear Effects in Sound Fields, with Special Emphasis on the
Generation of Vorticity and the Formation of Streaming
Patterns. He worked as a
research assistant in Oslo from 1954 to
1956, 1957 to 1958 and 1959 to 1960.
In between he studied
at Brown
University
from 1956 to
1957 and at the Max Planck
Institute. Among his advisors were
Johan Peter Holtsmark.
He was
appointed docent at the University of
Bergen
in 1960, and was promoted to professor in
1963. He succeeded
Oddvar
Bjørgum, and had responsibility for the university's education
in
applied mathematics. His
fields of research include
plasma,
nonlinear acoustics,
hydroacoustics and
acoustic streaming. He was also the dean
of the
Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences from 1975 to 1977,
and has held positions in
NAVF,
NTVF, and in the national committee of the
International
Union of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics.
He has also been a
visiting scholar at the University of Texas
.
Tjøtta married Jacqueline Naze, a colleague, in 1964—they barely
survived a car crash sustained on their
honeymoon. They have since done extensive research
together.
After retirement from the professor chair,
the couple moved to Oslo
.
Together with his wife, Tjøtta won a prize in
underwater acoustics from the
French Academy of Sciences. He is
a fellow of the
Acoustical
Society of America, and a member of the
Norwegian Academy of
Science and Letters. In 2002 he was decorated as a Knight,
First Class of the
Royal Norwegian Order of St.
Olav.
Tjøtta's most prominent hobby is
long-distance running. He discovered
his talent during a stay in the United States, where
jogging was popular. He ran the
marathon in 3:17.02 hours at the age of 66, and the
half marathon in 1:43.09 hours at the
age of 75.
References