Arkady Onishchik: on his life and work on supersymmetry

TL;DR

This paper reviews Arkady Onishchik's life and significant contributions to supersymmetry, including classification of supermanifolds, superstrings, and open problems in deformation theory relevant to physics.

Contribution

It highlights Onishchik's pioneering work on supermanifold classification, superstrings, and the impact of his research on supersymmetry and related open problems.

Findings

Classification of non-split supermanifolds and supercurves

Development of deformation theories with odd parameters

Open problems in supermanifold structures and supersymmetry

Abstract

Selected stories about the life of A. L. Onishchik, and a review of his contribution to the classification of non-split supermanifolds, in particular, supercurves a.k.a. superstrings; his editorial and educational work. A brief overview of his and his students' results in supersymmetry, and their impact on other researchers. Several open problems growing out of Onishchik's research are presented, some of them are related with odd parameters of deformations and non-holonomic structures of supermanifolds important in physical models, such as Minkowski superspaces and certain superstrings.