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Branko Grünbaum (; 2 October 1929 – 14 September 2018) was a Croatian-born
mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...
of
Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...
descentBranko Grünbaum
Hrvatska enciklopedija LZMK.
and a professor
emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". In some c ...
at the
University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...
in
Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...
. He received his Ph.D. in 1957 from Hebrew University of Jerusalem.


Life

Grünbaum was born in Osijek, then part of the
Kingdom of Yugoslavia The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was a country in Southeast Europe, Southeast and Central Europe that existed from 1918 until 1941. From 1918 to 1929, it was officially called the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, but the term "Yugoslavia" () h ...
, on 2 October 1929. His father was
Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...
and his mother was
Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
, so during
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
the family survived
the Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
by living at his Catholic grandmother's home. After the war, as a high school student, he met Zdenka Bienenstock, a Jew who had lived through the war hidden in a convent while the rest of her family were killed. Grünbaum became a student at the University of Zagreb, but grew disenchanted with the communist ideology of the
Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (commonly abbreviated as SFRY or SFR Yugoslavia), known from 1945 to 1963 as the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as Socialist Yugoslavia or simply Yugoslavia, was a country ...
, applied for emigration to Israel, and traveled with his family and Zdenka to
Haifa Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...
in 1949. In Israel, Grünbaum found a job in
Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...
, but in 1950 returned to the study of mathematics, at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He earned a master's degree in 1954 and in the same year married Zdenka, who continued as a master's student in chemistry. He served a tour of duty as an
operations research Operations research () (U.S. Air Force Specialty Code: Operations Analysis), often shortened to the initialism OR, is a branch of applied mathematics that deals with the development and application of analytical methods to improve management and ...
er in the Israeli Air Force beginning in 1955, and he and Zdenka had the first of their two sons in 1956. He completed his Ph.D. in 1957; his dissertation concerned convex geometry and was supervised by Aryeh Dvoretzky. After finishing his military service in 1958, Grünbaum and his family came to the US so that Grünbaum could become a postdoctoral researcher at the
Institute for Advanced Study The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry located in Princeton, New Jersey. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholars, including Albert Ein ...
. He then became a visiting researcher at the
University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...
in 1960. He agreed to return to Israel as a lecturer at the Hebrew University, but his plans were disrupted by the Israeli authorities determining that he was not a Jew (because his mother was not Jewish) and annulling his marriage; he and Zdenka remarried in Seattle before their return. Grünbaum remained affiliated with the Hebrew University until 1966, taking long research visits to the University of Washington and in 1965–1966 to
Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State or MSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan, United States. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State o ...
. However, during the Michigan visit, learning of another case similar to their marriage annulment, he and Zdenka decided to stay in the US instead of returning to Israel, where Zdenka was still a doctoral student in chemistry. Grünbaum was given a full professorship at the University of Washington in 1966, and he remained there until retiring in 2001.


Works

Grünbaum authored over 200 papers, mostly in discrete geometry, an area in which he is known for various classification theorems. He wrote on the theory of abstract polyhedra. His paper on line arrangements may have inspired a paper by N. G. de Bruijn on quasiperiodic tilings (the most famous example of which is the Penrose tiling of the plane). This paper is also cited by the authors of a monograph on hyperplane arrangements as having inspired their research. Grünbaum also devised a multi-set generalisation of Venn diagrams. He was an editor and a frequent contributor to '' Geombinatorics''. Grünbaum's classic monograph '' Convex Polytopes'', first published in 1967, became the main textbook on the subject. His monograph '' Tilings and patterns'', coauthored with G. C. Shephard, helped to rejuvenate interest in this classic field, and has proved popular with nonmathematical audiences, as well as with mathematicians. In 1976 Grünbaum won a Lester R. Ford Award for his expository article ''Venn diagrams and independent families of sets''. In 2004, Gil Kalai and Victor Klee edited a special issue of '' Discrete and Computational Geometry'' in his honor, the "Grünbaum Festschrift". In 2005, Grünbaum was awarded the Leroy P. Steele Prize for Mathematical Exposition from the American Mathematical Society. He was a Guggenheim Fellow, a Fellow of the AAAS and in 2012 he became a fellow of the American Mathematical Society. Grünbaum supervised 19 Ph.D.s and currently has at least 200 mathematical descendants.


Books

*. *. *. *.Reviews of ''Configurations of Points and Lines'': * *


As editor

*


See also

* Configuration (geometry) * Convex uniform honeycomb * Elongated square gyrobicupola * Goldner–Harary graph * Pentagram map * Simplicial sphere * Star coloring * Star polygon * Grünbaum's theorem * Grünbaum–Rigby configuration


References


Further reading

* *


External links


Personal web page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Grunbaum, Branko 1929 births 2018 deaths People from Osijek Yugoslav emigrants to Israel American people of Croatian-Jewish descent 20th-century American mathematicians Croatian mathematicians Combinatorialists University of Washington faculty Einstein Institute of Mathematics alumni Geometers Fellows of the American Mathematical Society Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science American textbook writers