Happy World Book Day

To celebrate World Book Day, my son had to dress up as a character linked to a book of his choice. When he picked THE MATHS BOOK, I seriously had to re-think his outfit options.

We finally decided if he was going to display his love for maths we should use it as an opportunity to showcase his Nigerian roots as well as create awareness of the great talents from the motherland.

I was really proud when my son dressed up this morning in a very special Ankara as Professor Chike Obi (April 17, 1921 – March 13, 2008) a Nigerian mathematician and professor.

An interesting fact 😊, Professor Obi taught my dearly departed mother-in-law Mrs Elizabeth O. Ugowe mathematics at the University of Lagos. For anyone who was privileged to have been taught mathematics by my mother-in-law, many of them will say their love of maths was largely due to my mother-in-law teaching technique.

Professor Obi was educated in various parts of Nigeria before reading mathematics as an external student of the University of London. Immediately after his first degree, he won a scholarship to do research study at Pembroke College, Cambridge, followed by doctoral studies at MIT, United States, becoming in 1950, the first Nigerian to receive a PhD in mathematics. 

Professor Obi returned to lecture at the premier Nigerian University of Ibadan and also lectured in 1970 at the University of Lagos. When he went back to his roots in Onitsha, he established the Nanna Institute for Scientific Studies.

Professor Obi won the Sigvard Eklund Prize for original work in differential equation from the International Centre for Theoretical Physics. He was a university teacher until his retirement as an Emeritus Professor in 1985. 

The African Mathematics Union suggests that he was the first Nigerian to hold a doctorate in mathematics. Professor Obi’s early research dealt mainly with the question of the existence of periodic solutions of non-linear ordinary differential equations. He successfully used the perturbation technique, and several of his publications greatly helped to stimulate research interest in this subject throughout the world and have become classics in the literature.

Happy World Book Day📙