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Peter Ladislaw Hammer was born in
Timisoara, Romania in 1936. He earned his Ph.D. under Academician
Grigore Moisil at the University of Bucharest. After he married Anca
Ivanescu in 1961, the two defected to Israel in 1967. There, he was a
professor at the Technion in Haifa. After moving to Canada in 1969, he
taught at the University of Montreal, then later at the University of
Waterloo. In 1983 he moved to the US and became a professor at Rutgers
University.
Dr. Hammer was the founding
Director of RUTCOR - Rutgers University
Center for Operations Research, Editor-in-Chief and founder of numerous
professional journals, including Discrete Mathematics, Discrete Applied
Mathematics, Discrete Optimization, Annals of Discrete Mathematics,
Annals of Operations Research and the SIAM Monographs on Discrete
Mathematics and Applications. His publications include 19 books and
over 240 papers.
He was one of the most influential
researchers in the fields of
Operations Research and Discrete Applied Mathematics. He made numerous
major contributions to these fields, launching several new research
directions. His results influenced hundreds of colleagues in discrete
mathematics and operations research, and made a lasting impact on
several areas, including binary optimization and algorithmic graph
theory. His landmark book on Boolean Methods in Operations Research and
Related Areas (co-authored with S. Rudeanu, Springer-Verlag, 1968)
founded the new area of pseudo-Boolean optimization.
His systematic approach to study
the combinatorial structure of Boolean
functions, and their role in and relationship to optimization problems
developed a whole new Theory of Boolean Functions (a book about this
field, co-edited and co-authored with Y. Crama, is forthcoming from
Cambridge University Press, 2007). He applied in novel ways Boolean
techniques to other areas, including graph theory, integer programming,
data analysis, just to mention a few. His application of such Boolean
techniques to data analysis proved to be particularly novel and
effective. The technique, called Logical Analysis of Data (LAD), was
successfully applied to several real-life data analysis problems,
including in the last few years numerous medical datasets.
Dr. Hammer contributed to and
promoted the field of Operations Research
in several different ways. Besides his mathematical results, books and
papers, he launched series of professional publications, and was a
relentless organizer of professional conferences and workshops. He
always made sure that these events and forums provided opportunities
for interactions, in particular for younger researchers. He created the
research center RUTCOR also as an open institution, where seminars,
workshops, graduate courses, and a constant flow of visiting colleagues
create a buzzing research environment.
Dr. Hammer was internationally
recognized as a leading researcher of
Operations Research and modern Discrete Applied Mathematics. He
received numerous distinctions, including honorary degrees from the
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (1986), University of
Rome "La Sapienza" (1998), University of Liege (1999), the "George
Tzitzeica" prize of the Romanian Academy of Science (1966), and the
Euler Medal of the Institute of Combinatorics and its Applications
(1999). He was a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement
of Science from 1974, and a Founding Fellow of the Institute of
Combinatorics and its Applications. Several conferences were dedicated
to him, including the First International Colloquium on
Pseudo-Boolean Optimization (Chexbres, Switzerland, 1987), the Workshop
and
Symposia Honoring Peter L. Hammer (Caesarea Rothchild
Institute, University of Haifa, 2003) and the International
Conference on Graphs and Optimization (GO V, Leukerbad,
Switzerland, 2006).
Dr. Hammer was not only an amazing
scholar and a tireless organizer,
but also a very kind and generous person. He made everybody feel
comfortable to work with him, let it be on mathematics or on planning a
conference. He helped younger researchers and graduate students with
good advice, supporting letters, or sometimes even with loans and
presents. He supervised numerous graduate students with respect and
fatherly understanding, considering each of them as his 'best student'.
One of his final lectures was
entitled "Why not to turn 70" and
subtitled "Problems left for my second and third lives". This
exemplified not only his humor, but also his relentless energy.
He was a loving husband, father
and grandfather. He is survived by his
wife, Anca, his two sons Alexander and Maxim, his mother Anne, his
sister Evi, brother-in-law Ghita, niece Dana, and daughters-in-law,
Robin and Stacey, and his many cousins. His four beloved grandchildren,
Isabelle, Madeline, Annelise, and Oliver, knew him as their dear "Api".
He will be missed by everyone who knew him, always and forever.
His family collects stories,
facts, thoughts, feelings, and even rumors
about Peter L. Hammer. Please email your comments to: maximhammer@yahoo.com.
Contribution in His Memory may be
made to:
Post-Polio Health International (PHI)
4207 Lindell Boulevard
St. Louis, Missouri 63108-2915
USA
either by writing a check to Post-Polio
Health
International or directly through their website http://www.post-polio.org/don-mem.html
Please, kindly mention "In Memory of Peter
Hammer".
List of publications of
Peter L. Hammer
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