EWM had thepleasure to publish a short text about prof. Zdenka Riecanova, one of the leading Slovak woman mathematicians, prepared by Daniela Velichova

Prof. RNDr. Zdenka Riečanová, PhD. was born on the 14th of December 1935 in Komjatice, a small village in Slovakia. Regardless her age, she is unbelievable vivid, fresh and active person. Among her students at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering of the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, where she is teaching for almost 50 years, she looks like a girl, although they call her familiarly ”mum”.

An enormous power is hidden behind her fragile look, power that enables her to influence strongly everybody in her neighbourhood. This power also helps her to overcome all obstacles brought by the life.
After she graduated from the Comenius University in
Bratislava, she was married and took care about two children, to whom she was not only mother, but also their teacher and doctor. At this time, in the year 1966, she was awarded the academic title PhD. in physical-mathematical sciences, while she was one of the youngest scientists in Slovakia who achieved it.
Prof. Riečanová is one of the world leading mathematical personalities in quantum logics and structures. She is the author of 78 original scientific and 21 specialised papers published in internationally acknowledged scientific journals, 2 monographies, 4 lecture notes and 1 book. Number of citations of her papers exceeded 250.
She is the leader of the scientific seminar ”Measure, topology and quantum structures”, a follow up of the seminar ”Measure and topology”, that was also held by prof. Riečanová for 15 years. These seminars were a forum for cooperation of group of Slovak mathematicians from different universities, Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, University of Matej Bell in Banská Bystrica and Military Academy in Liptovský Mikuláš. Activities of the seminar group are strongly influenced by the ideas of prof. Riečanová, and the core members are PhD. students from her school.

Prof. Riečanová is a non-feministic feminist, a real example of how the positive feminism should be applied in practice. She is not declaring, but actively helping all women around who need her help, as an active member of the Emmy Noether Verein. Thanks to the international projects under her leadership, her colleagues can enjoy and use the latest ICT in their scientific work.

In 1996 she received the full professorship and helped also other colleagues to promote their scientific career.
Her pedagogical activities comprise lectures on calculus, numerical mathematics, probability and mathematical statistics, theory of special functions, differential equations, fuzzy mathematics, and other. In cooperation with prof. Gudrun Kalmbach from the University in Ulm in Germany, she is the co-organizer of the International Scientific Conferences in Applied Mathematics ISCAM for undergraduate and graduate students, held for 10 years. prof. Riečaná is acknowledged also internationally, she is the member of the committee of the International Quantum Structures Association, Bernoulli’s Society, American Mathematical Society and Emmy Noether Verein.