Department of Mathematics

At the Department of Mathematics, according to the Statute from 1966, the following groups of sciences were studied:

• I-1. Mathematics – general direction
• I-2. Mathematics with physics – general direction
• I-3. Mathematics with design geometry – teacher's course
• I-4. Mathematics with physics – teaching major
• Mathematics with physics – I degree

Upon completion of studies, the following titles were acquired:

• I-1. Mathematics – general major – graduate mathematician
• I-2. Mathematics with physics – general major – graduate mathematician
• I-3. Mathematics with design geometry – teacher's course – professor of mathematics
• I-4. Mathematics with physics – teaching major – professor of mathematics
• Mathematics with physics – I level – mathematics teacher

The Department had the following chairs:

• Department of Mathematical Analysis and Algebra
• Department of Geometry
• Department of Numerical Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics

Vera Šnajder was born on February 2, 1904, in Reljevo, near Sarajevo, in the family of a university rector. She died on February 14, 1976, in Sarajevo. She finished elementary school and classical high school in Sarajevo in 1922. She enrolled at the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade – a group of applied mathematics, theoretical mathematics, and experimental physics for the academic year 1922/23. years. Due to an interruption caused by a serious illness, she finished her studies in 1928. From the end of his studies until November 1929. she was a teacher at the Women's Gymnasium in Sarajevo, when, as one of the best students of her generation and a promising young mathematician, she received a scholarship from the French government and went to Paris for training.

Thus, Vera Šnajder in the academic year 1929/30. spends the year at the famous “Henri Poincaré” Institute in Paris, where he participates in work of seminars. Since she stood out with special results, she received and accepted an offer to work as a part-time associate in the Hydrodynamics Laboratory at the Sorbonne. He remained at that job until the end of 1932 when he returned to Sarajevo. During her study stay in Paris, Vera Šnajder published her first scientific paper in the Comptes Rendus des Sciences de l'Académie des Sciences, which was also the first scientific paper in the field of mathematics published by an author born in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Some of her experimental results were later presented at an exhibition in Paris. In addition, there is a document from which it can be seen that during her stay in Paris, Vera Schneider was also offered an engagement for the needs of the French Air Ministry.

Upon her return from Paris, at the end of 1932, Vera Šnajder returned to her position as a teacher at the Women's Gymnasium in Sarajevo, where she enjoyed great authority, both among her students and their parents, and among her colleagues. As an advanced intellectual, she belonged to the circle of left-oriented Sarajevo intellectuals together with her husband Dr. Marcel Šnajder, one of the first doctors of philosophy in Bosnia and Herzegovina, otherwise, a professor of philosophy and mathematics.

After liberation, in June 1945, she was appointed director of the Second Girls’ High School, and in March 1946. becomes one of the first professors of the Higher Pedagogical School in Sarajevo. November 1947. she was appointed as an advisor in the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where she works tirelessly to restore the work of schools and solve difficult staffing problems. In June 1948. returns to the Higher Pedagogical School.

Vera Šnajder participated in the founding of the Faculty of Philosophy in Sarajevo in 1950, especially in the creation and organization of the Department of Mathematics. In March 1950. she was elected to the position of associate professor, and academically in 1950/51. the study of mathematics was organized for the first time in Bosnia and Herzegovina. For many years, Professor Vera Šnajder remains at the head of that department whose development and success was closely linked primarily to her work. She invested a large part of her life in the Department, which would grow into the Department of Mathematics of the Faculty of Science in 1960. By connecting the Department with scientific circles in the country and abroad and sending younger colleagues there for education, she enabled the development of young scientists in our midst, whose education and creation no one has ever cared about as selflessly as she did.

At the Department of Mathematics, later the Department of Mathematics, prof. Vera Šnajder constantly taught the subjects Differential Geometry and Rational Mechanics, and occasionally, especially in the first years, also the subjects Linear Algebra and Introduction to Algebra.

Vera Šnejder's activity was not limited to the Department of Mathematics. Academic 1951/52. year and 1958/59. year she was appointed dean, and in 1952/53, 1957/58. and 1959/60. year for the vice dean of the Faculty of Philosophy. It should certainly be emphasized that by being elected dean in 1951, Vera Šnajder entered history as the first female dean, not only of one of the first faculties in Bosnia and Herzegovina but also as the first female dean of a Yugoslav faculty.

Since the establishment of the Faculty of Science and Mathematics in 1960, she has been a long-term member of the University Council, on several occasions a member of the Council for Education of Bosnia and Herzegovina, president of the Commission of the Council of the National Library, member of the Commission for awarding the title of scientific associate, i.e. the title of educational advisor, president of the Commission for professor exams. She was also the long-term president of the Society Yugoslavia – France and others.

She was particularly active as the president of the Association of Mathematicians, Physicists and Astronomers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and was also the main organizer of the IV Congress of Mathematicians, Physicists and Astronomers of Yugoslavia held in Sarajevo in 1965.

In her scientific work, Vera Šnajder dealt with Riemann's and Finsler's geometry in rational mechanics, giving the integral principles of rational mechanics a geometric interpretation.

Mahmut Bajraktarević (1909-1985) was born in Sarajevo and died in Bugojno. He finished elementary school and high school in Sarajevo, where he graduated in 1929. He graduated in mathematics from the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade in 1933. From 1934 until the end of the Second World War, he was a teacher at the gymnasium in Sarajevo.

As a mathematics professor, he worked at Šeriatska, Second and First male high schools, as well as at the Higher Pedagogical School in Sarajevo.

From 1950 to the end of 1960. he was a lecturer, assistant professor and associate professor at the Department of Science and Mathematics at the Faculty of Philosophy in Sarajevo. He remained at the newly founded Faculty of Science, where, after some time, he was elected full professor until his retirement in 1980.

He obtained his doctorate in mathematical sciences in 1953 at the Sorbonne by defending his dissertation: Sur certaines suites itérées (On certain iterated sequences).

Mahmut Bajraktarević published about 60 scientific works. His results belong to two important areas of mathematical analysis: the theory of functional equations, that is, the theory of series and summability, in which, in particular, he studied the summability of iterative series using generalized means and the speed of convergence. A large number of his works represented a significant contribution to that issue and were an incentive to other mathematicians for further research. This brought him reputation in our country and in the world.

Academician Bajraktarević also performed a number of very important and responsible functions significant for the development of mathematics. He was vice-dean of the Faculty of Philosophy, head of the Mathematics Department of the Faculty of Science, head of the Department of Mathematical Analysis, secretary and vice-president of the Society of Mathematicians, Physicists and Astronomers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as a member of numerous boards and commissions. He was the first editor-in-chief of Radovi matematski.

In 1961, he became a corresponding member of the Scientific Society of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was the forerunner of the Academy of Sciences and Arts of Bosnia and Herzegovina. With its development into the Academy of Sciences and Arts of Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1966. Professor Bajraktarević becomes a corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences and Arts of Bosnia and Herzegovina. He was elected a regular member in 1967.

His work in the Department of Natural and Mathematical Sciences of the Academy of Sciences and Arts of Bosnia and Herzegovina, where he was secretary for a period, was useful.

He showed great activity in the Society of Mathematicians, Physicists and Astronomers of Bosnia and Herzegovina, as well as in the Union of Societies of Mathematicians, Physicists, and Astronomers of Yugoslavia. His works of pedagogical and didactic character are also well known.

He wrote a large number of reviews for textbooks, manuals, and assignment collections intended for primary and secondary schools, i.e. colleges, and collaborated in the development of plans and programs for the teaching of mathematics and physics in primary and secondary schools. He played a decisive role in the overall development of BiH mathematics.

Academician Bajraktarević's scientific interest and corresponding successful scientific results were realized, first of all, in the field of functional equations, especially those related to certain environments, and then in the field of iterative sequences and summability theory. 56 of his published scientific papers are registered in Mathematical Reviews AMS. These works aroused the considerable interest of domestic and foreign mathematicians. A large part of them, in addition to favorable reviews in international reference journals, received a prominent place in several world monographs, such as, for example, in Itoga science and technology, Matematicheskii analiz, Tom 12 (1974), in the monographs of Janos Aczel, Marek Kuzma, D. S. Mitrinović and others. His works on general environments gave impetus to further research, in which domestic and foreign mathematicians participated. He presented the results of his research at several domestic and foreign mathematical meetings. He gave lectures at the Mathematics Institute in Belgrade, at the Mathematics Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Soviet Union in Moscow, and at the University of Debrecen.

In a large number of Bajraktarević's works, great attention was paid to functional equations of various types. Necessary and sufficient conditions for a certain solution of the equation are discussed. These works are closely related to the corresponding works of a number of foreign and domestic authors. The most significant works refer to various types of environments. Basic problems of equality, homogeneity, and characterization of environments are addressed. And these works are connected with a series of works by foreign authors. Bajraktarević dealt with various issues related to the theory of summability, where he achieved important results.

As a distinguished scientific and teaching worker, he significantly contributed to the development of mathematics in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

He received various recognitions and significant awards. Even today, it is quoted a lot in new texts that talk about fractals.

Mahmut Bajraktarević's works, when they were created, had a purely theoretical character, but some of them, due to the development of computational geometry, also become interesting for applied mathematics. Thus, after the introduction of the Read-Bajraktarević operator, using Maple, it is proved that fractal curves can be obtained as solutions to some functional equations with the so-called Read-Bajraktarević as operator.