- J. M. R. Parrondo
Infobox Scientist
box_width = 300px
name = J. M. R. Parrondo
image_size = 300px
caption = Juan M. R. Parrondo, photographed in 2003 byDerek Abbott .
birth_date = Birth date and age|1964|1|9|mf=y
birth_place =Madrid ,Spain
death_date =
death_place =
residence = Spain
citizenship =
nationality = Spanish
ethnicity =
fields =Physicist
workplaces = UCM
alma_mater = UCM
doctoral_advisor = nowrap|Francisco Javier de la Rubia
academic_advisors =Thomas M. Cover Katja Lindenberg
doctoral_students = Javier BucetaBorja JiménezLuis Dinis
notable_students =
known_for =Parrondo's paradox Brownian ratchet sPhysics of informationStatistical mechanics
author_abbrev_bot =
author_abbrev_zoo =
influences =Douglas Hofstadter
influenced =Derek Abbott
awards =
religion =
footnotes =J. M. R. Parrondo, [While Spanish scientists normally use the first of their two surnames when publishing in English-speaking journals, Parrondo publishes under his second surname.] [In various sources Parrondo's name is sometimes incorrectly spelled "Parrando," an error that can be traced to a
January 25 ,2000 article on "Parrando's Paradox" (sic) in the "New York Times " that propagated the incorrect spelling.] also Juan Manuel Rodríguez Parrondo, (b.January 9 ,1964 ) is a Spanishphysicist best known for the strikingly counterintuitiveParrondo's paradox , where switching between losing strategies can in some cases win. In 1996, he developed games of chance, now calledParrondo's games , that exhibited this apparently paradoxical phenomenon. Much of his work touches on thermodynamics and information, and he is known for contributions to the theory of noised inducedphase transitions ,Brownian ratchet s, physics of information, andstatistical mechanics .Biography
He was born in
Madrid ,Spain , as Juan Manuel Rodríguez Parrondo. Parrondo was inspired to study physics when he was at high-school, after reading an article on quantum mechanics byDouglas Hofstadter published in "Scientific American ."Fact|date=June 2007 He obtained both his bachelors degree (1987) and his PhD (1992) from the Complutense University of Madrid. His external doctoral advisor wasFrancisco Javier de la Rubia based at UNED. The topic of Parrondo's doctoral thesis was in the area ofstochastic differential equation s andrandom walk s infractal s. His doctoral thesis was entitled "Técnicas Geométricas y de Renormalización en Procesos Estocásticos" (Geometrical renormalization techniques for stochastic processes).After his doctoral thesis, Parrondo carried out postdoctoral research that combined themes in information theory and thermodynamics—this proved influential in shaping his future directions. As a postdoctoral researcher he worked on noise induced
phase transition s withKatja Lindenberg at UCSD, U.S., in1992 ;neural network s withChris Van den Broeck at Hasselt University, Belgium, in1993 ;Maxwell demon s underThomas M. Cover atStanford University , U.S., in1995 .In 1996, he obtained a permanent position at the Complutense University of Madrid and it was in this year that he devised the concept of losing games of chance, which paradoxically win when combined. In 1999, he visited
Marcello O. Magnasco at theRockefeller University ,New York , working onBrownian ratchet s andDerek Abbott at theUniversity of Adelaide ,Australia , working onParrondo's games . In 2005, Parrondo performed another extended collaborative visit, this time withCarlos Bustamante at theUniversity of California, Berkeley , U.S., working inmolecular motor s.In the
2003 -2004 period, Parrondo performed a regular series of science items for the Spanish Public National Radio (RNE). From2001 to present, Parrondo is the Spanish equivalent ofMartin Gardner writing the "Mathematical Games " column for the Spanish edition of "Scientific American " called "Investigación & Ciencia." Although this column in the English-speaking version has been discontinued, the "Mathematical Games " column is alive and well under the leadership of Parrondo in the Spanish edition.Genesis of Parrondo's Games
Parrondo initially devised his countintuitive games of chance, in 1996, as an illustration of how
Brownian ratchet s operate and first presented the idea on a viewgraph slide entitled "How to Cheat a Bad Mathematician," at an EEC workshop on "Complexity and Chaos,"Torino ,Italy . In that same year he published an article critiquing Richard Feynman's analysis of a Brownian ratchet in the "American Journal of Physics ."Derek Abbott at theUniversity of Adelaide ,Australia , was working on a related, but still unsolved, problem regarding Feynman's analysis. Parrondo's article prompted Abbott to fly to Madrid in 1997 and they met for the first time—but the problem proved tough and it was not until 1999 they finally published a solution. However, in the meantime, Parrondo shared the concept of his paradoxical games—consequently Abbott coined the terms "Parrondo's paradox" and "Parrondo's games," publishing verification of the result in the journal "Nature", in 1999.Works by Juan M.R. Parrondo
"Noise-Induced Non-equilibrium Phase Transition" C. Van den Broeck, J. M. R. Parrondo and R. Toral, Physical Review Letters, vol. 73 p. 3395 (1994)
Notes and references
Further reading
"Game theory: Losing strategies can win by Parrondo's paradox" G. P. Harmer and D. Abbott, Nature vol. 402, p 864 (1999)
External links
* [http://seneca.fis.ucm.es/parr/ Home page of Juan M. R. Parrondo]
* [http://genealogy.math.ndsu.nodak.edu/html/id.phtml?id=107097 Parrondo´s Math Genealogy]
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