1680-1751 English mathematician who made significant progress towards understanding the number pi (π), which he calculated to over 100 decimal places. Machin developed one of the first efficient trigonometric identities that could be used to...

John Machin, (bapt. 1686?—June 9, 1751),[1] a professor of astronomy at Gresham College, London, is best known for developing a quickly converging series for π in 1706 and using it to compute π to 100 decimal places. Machin's formula...