- Jack Kiefer (mathematician)
Jack Carl Kiefer (
January 25 ,1924 –August 10 ,1981 ) was an American statistician.Biography
Jack Kiefer was born on
January 25 ,1924 , inCincinnati, Ohio , to Carl Jack Kiefer and Marguerite K. Rosenau. He began his undergraduate studies at theMassachusetts Institute of Technology in 1942, but left after one year, taking up a position asfirst lieutenant in theUnited States Air Force duringWorld War II . In 1946, he returned to MIT, graduating with bachelor's and master's degrees ineconomics andengineering in 1948 under the supervision of Harold Freeman. He then began graduate studies atColumbia University , under the supervision ofAbraham Wald andJacob Wolfowitz , receiving his Ph.D. in mathematical statistics in 1952. While still a graduate student, he began teaching atCornell University , remaining there until 1979, when he retired from Cornell and accepted a new position as Miller Research Professor in the Department of Statistics and Mathematics at theUniversity of California, Berkeley . In 1957, he married Dooley Sciple, a former undergraduate student of his at Cornell, with whom he had two children. Kiefer died of a heart attack inBerkeley, California onAugust 10 ,1981 .harvnb|Bechhofer|1982; harvnb|O'Connor|Robertson|2004.]Awards and honors
Kiefer was a
Fellow of theAmerican Statistical Association and of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, a member of theAmerican Academy of Arts and Sciences (elected 1972) and of theUnited States National Academy of Sciences (elected 1975). From 1969–1970 he was president of theInstitute of Mathematical Statistics . In 1973, Kiefer andMichael Fisher were the first two Cornell faculty elected asHorace White Professors. [ [http://dspace.library.cornell.edu/bitstream/1813/5340/12/004_19.pdf 2 Professors Are Named To Horace White Chairs] , Cornell Chronicle, vol. 4, no. 19, Feb. 22, 1973.]Contributions
Much of Kiefer's research was on the
design of experiments ; [harvnb|Wynn|1984.] the "American Statistician" obituary calls him "undoubtedly the foremost worker in optimal experimental design". However, he also made significant contributions to other areas of statistics and optimization, [harvnb|Brown|1984] including the introduction ofgolden section search (his master's thesis work) and theDvoretzky-Kiefer-Wolfowitz inequality .Kiefer has
Erdős number 2 due to his collaborations withAryeh Dvoretzky andMark Kac .Notes
References
*citation
title = Jack Carl Kiefer 1924–1981
journal =The American Statistician
last = Bechhofer
first = R.
volume = 36
issue = 4
year = 1982
pages = 356–357
url = http://www.jstor.org/view/00031305/di020572/02p0043s/0.*citation
title = Jack Carl Kiefer: Collected Papers, Vols. I, II, III
publisher = Springer-Verlag
year = 1985
last1 = Brown
first1 = L. D.
last2 = Olkin
first1 = I.
last3 = Sacks
first3 = J.
last4 = Wynn
first4 = H. P.
id = ISBN 0-387-96003-1, ISBN 0-387-96004-X. Reviewed in [http://www.jstor.org/view/0006341x/di009363/00p0036b/0 "Biometrics" 43 (1): 257] .*citation
title = The research of Jack Kiefer outside the area of experimental design
last = Brown
first = Lawrence D.
journal =Annals of Statistics
volume = 12
issue = 2
year = 1984
pages = 406–415
url = http://www.jstor.org/view/00905364/di983922/98p00356/0.*citation
url = http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Kiefer.html
title = Kiefer biography
publisher = MacTutor History of Mathematics
year = 2004
last1 = O'Connor
first1 = J. J.
last2 = Robertson
first2 = E. F..*citation
title = Jack Carl Kiefer 1924–1981
last = Sacks
first = Jerome
journal = Annals of Statistics
volume = 12
issue = 2
year = 1984
pages = 403–405
url = http://www.jstor.org/view/00905364/di983922/98p00345/0.*citation
title = Jack Kiefer's contributions to experimental design
last = Wynn
first = Henry P.
journal = Annals of Statistics
volume = 12
issue = 2
year = 1984
pages = 416–423
url = http://www.jstor.org/view/00905364/di983922/98p00367/0.*citation
title = The publications and writings of Jack Kiefer
journal = Annals of Statistics
volume = 12
issue = 2
year = 1984
pages = 424–430
url = http://www.jstor.org/view/00905364/di983922/98p00377/0.
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