Elwyn Berlekamp

Elwyn Berlekamp
Berlekamp in 2005
Born	Elwyn Ralph Berlekamp (1940-09-06)September 6, 1940 Dover, Ohio, U.S.
Died	April 9, 2019(2019-04-09) (aged 78) Piedmont, California, U.S.
Alma mater	Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Known for	Berlekamp's algorithm Berlekamp switching game Berlekamp–Welch algorithm Berlekamp–Massey algorithm Berlekamp–Rabin algorithm Berlekamp–Zassenhaus algorithm Berlekamp–Van Lint–Seidel graph Blockbusting Combinatorial game theory Cooling and heating Coupon Go Error-correcting codes with feedback Partisan game Phutball
Awards	IEEE Richard W. Hamming Medal (1991) Claude E. Shannon Award (1993)
Scientific career
Fields	Information theory, Coding theory, Combinatorial game theory
Institutions	University of California, Berkeley
Thesis	Block coding with noiseless feedback (1964)
Doctoral advisor	Robert G. Gallager
Doctoral students	Julia Kempe
Other notable students	Ken Thompson

Elwyn Ralph Berlekamp (September 6, 1940 – April 9, 2019) was a professor of mathematics and computer science at the University of California, Berkeley.[1][2] Berlekamp was widely known for his work in computer science, coding theory and combinatorial game theory.

Berlekamp invented an algorithm to factor polynomials and the Berlekamp switching game, and was one of the inventors of the Berlekamp–Welch algorithm and the Berlekamp–Massey algorithms, which are used to implement Reed–Solomon error correction. He also co-invented the Berlekamp–Rabin algorithm, Berlekamp–Zassenhaus algorithm, and the Berlekamp–Van Lint–Seidel graph.

Berlekamp had also been active in investing, and ran Axcom, which became the Renaissance Technologies' Medallion Fund.

Life and education

Berlekamp was born in Dover, Ohio. His family moved to Northern Kentucky, where from 1954 Berlekamp attended Fort Thomas Highlands High School in Fort Thomas, Kentucky. He was elected class president and joined the swim team which practiced naked at the local YMCA pool; Berlekamp was the slowest swimmer but chose swimming because of the low level of competition compared to other sports.[3] He decided to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) after learning it did not have an American football team. At MIT, his freshman professors included John Forbes Nash Jr. and he was a Putnam Fellow during his senior year in 1961.[3][4] He completed his bachelor's and master's degrees in electrical engineering in 1962. Berlekamp did internships at Bell Labs in 1960 and 1962, where his boss was John Larry Kelly Jr.[3] Continuing his studies at MIT, he finished his Ph.D. in electrical engineering in 1964; his advisors were Robert G. Gallager, Peter Elias, Claude Shannon, and John Wozencraft.

Berlekamp met his wife, Jennifer Wilson, in 1964 after juggling in his apartment and having to apologize for causing a noise disturbance.[3] They had two daughters and a son. He lived in Piedmont, California and died in April 2019 at the age of 78 from complications of pulmonary fibrosis.[5]

Career

Berlekamp was a professor of electrical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley from 1964 until 1966, when he became a mathematics researcher at Bell Labs. In 1971, Berlekamp returned to Berkeley as professor of mathematics and computer science, where he served as the advisor for over twenty doctoral students.[1][2][6]

He was a member of the National Academy of Engineering (1977)[7] and the National Academy of Sciences (1999).[8] He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1996,[9] and became a fellow of the American Mathematical Society in 2012.[10] In 1991, he received the IEEE Richard W. Hamming Medal,[11] and in 1993, the Claude E. Shannon Award. In 1998, he received a Golden Jubilee Award for Technological Innovation from the IEEE Information Theory Society.[12] Along with Tom M. Rodgers[13] he was one of the founders of Gathering 4 Gardner and was on its board for many years.[14] In the mid-1980s, he was president of Cyclotomics, Inc., a corporation that developed error-correcting code technology.[1]

He studied various games, including dots and boxes, fox and geese, and, especially, Go. Berlekamp and co-author David Wolfe describe methods for analyzing certain classes of Go endgames in the book Mathematical Go.

Berlekamp and Martin Gardner

Berlekamp was a close friend of Scientific American columnist Martin Gardner and was an important member of the gifted and diverse group of people that Gardner nurtured and acted as a conduit for; people who inspired Gardner and who were in turn inspired by him.[15] Berlekamp teamed up with John Horton Conway and Richard K. Guy, two other close associates of Gardner, to co-author the book Winning Ways for your Mathematical Plays, leading to his recognition as one of the founders of combinatorial game theory.[16] The dedication of their book says, "To Martin Gardner, who has brought more mathematics to more millions than anyone else."[17]

Berlekamp and Gardner both had great love for and were strong advocates of recreational mathematics.[16] Conferences called Gathering 4 Gardner (G4G) are held every two years to celebrate the Gardner legacy.[15] Berlekamp was one of the founders of G4G and was on its board of directors for many years.[18]

Selected publications

• Block coding with noiseless feedback. Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, 1964.
• Algebraic Coding Theory, New York: McGraw-Hill, 1968. Revised ed., Aegean Park Press, 1984, ISBN 0-89412-063-8.
• (with John Horton Conway and Richard K. Guy) Winning Ways for your Mathematical Plays.
  • 1st edition, New York: Academic Press, 2 vols., 1982;[19] vol. 1, hardback: ISBN 0-12-091150-7, paperback: ISBN 0-12-091101-9; vol. 2, hardback: ISBN 0-12-091152-3, paperback: ISBN 0-12-091102-7.
  • 2nd edition, Wellesley, Massachusetts: A. K. Peters Ltd., 4 vols., 2001–2004; vol. 1: ISBN 1-56881-130-6; vol. 2: ISBN 1-56881-142-X; vol. 3: ISBN 1-56881-143-8; vol. 4: ISBN 1-56881-144-6.
• (with David Wolfe) Mathematical Go. Wellesley, Massachusetts: A. K. Peters Ltd., 1994. ISBN 1-56881-032-6.[20]
• The Dots-and-Boxes Game. Natick, Massachusetts: A. K. Peters Ltd., 2000. ISBN 1-56881-129-2.

See also

• Berlekamp switching game
• Berlekamp–Zassenhaus algorithm

References

1. "Contributors". IEEE Transactions on Information Theory. 42 (3): 1048. May 1996. doi:10.1109/TIT.1996.490574. ISSN 0018-9448.
2. Elwyn Berlekamp, listing at the Department of Mathematics, University of California, Berkeley.
3. Zuckerman, Gregory (2019-11-05). The Man Who Solved the Market (1st ed.). Penguin Random House. pp. 88–92. ISBN 978-0-7352-1798-0.
4. "Putnam Competition Individual and Team Winners". Mathematical Association of America. Retrieved December 12, 2021.
5. "Elwyn Berlekamp, game theorist and coding pioneer, dies at 78". Berkeley. 2022. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
6. Contributors, IEEE Transactions on Information Theory 20, #3 (May 1974), p. 408.
7. "NAE Members Directory – Dr. Elwyn R. Berlekamp". NAE. Retrieved June 16, 2011.
8. "NAS Membership Directory". NAS. Retrieved June 16, 2011. Search with "Last Name" is Berlekamp.
9. "Book of Members, 1780–2010: Chapter B" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved June 16, 2011.
10. "Fellows of the American Mathematical Society". American Mathematical Society. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
11. "IEEE Richard W. Hamming Medal Recipients" (PDF). IEEE. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 20, 2010. Retrieved May 29, 2011.
12. "Golden Jubilee Awards for Technological Innovation". IEEE Information Theory Society. Retrieved July 14, 2011.
13. Rothstein, Edward (2004-04-03). "Puzzles + Math = Magic". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
14. About Gathering 4 Gardner Foundation Archived 2016-05-07 at the Wayback Machine
15. Hirth, Tiago (2020-01-24). "Remembering Elwyn Berlekamp". Gathering 4 Gardner. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
16. The Mathematical Legacy of Martin Gardner by Elwyn Berlekamp, Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), September 2, 2014: Partly because of what I had read about them in Martin Gardner’s columns, I was appropriately awestruck in the 1960s when I first met Sol Golomb and then Richard Guy, each of whom had a large influence on my subsequent work. In 1969 Richard introduced me to John Horton Conway, and the three of us immediately began collaborating on a book that eventually became Winning Ways for Your Mathematical Plays. In the 1970s, I joined Conway in some of his many visits to Gardner’s home on Euclid Avenue, in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York. Gardner soon became an enthusiastic advocate of our book project, and he previewed various snippets of it in his Scientific American columns.
17. Berlekamp, Elwyn R., John H. Conway, and Richard K. Guy (1982). Winning Ways for your Mathematical Plays Academic Press, ISBN 0120911507.
18. History of the Gathering Archived 2019-04-18 at the Wayback Machine Gathering 4 Gardner
19. Golomb, Solomon (1983). "Review: Winning ways for your mathematical plays, by E. R. Berlekamp, J. H. Conway, and R. K. Guy". Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. (N.S.). 8 (1): 108–111. doi:10.1090/s0273-0979-1983-15098-x.
20. Guy, Richard K.; Nowakowski, Richard J. (1995). "Review: Mathematical Go: Chilling gets the last point, by Elwyn Berlekamp and David Wolfe" (PDF). Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. (N.S.). 32 (4): 437–441. doi:10.1090/S0273-0979-1995-00601-4.

External links

• Elwyn Berlekamp home page at the University of California, Berkeley.
• Elwyn Berlekamp at the Mathematics Genealogy Project.