Donald W. Marquardt (March 13, 1929, New York City – July 5, 1997, New Castle, Delaware) was an American statistician, the rediscoverer of the Levenberg–Marquardt nonlinear least squares fitting algorithm.Paul Davis (1993)
Levenberg–Marquart Methods and Nonlinear Estimation
, ''SIAM News'', Vol. 26, Number 6, October 1993. Marquardt was educated at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

with bachelor's degree in 1950 in physics and mathematics and at the

University of Delaware The University of Delaware (colloquially UD or Delaware) is a public land-grant research university located in Newark, Delaware. UD is the largest university in Delaware. It offers three associate's programs, 148 bachelor's programs, 121 mas ...

with master's degree in 1956 in mathematics and statistics. Marquardt joined

DuPont DuPont de Nemours, Inc., commonly shortened to DuPont, is an American multinational chemical company first formed in 1802 by French-American chemist and industrialist Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours. The company played a major role in ...

in 1953 and worked there for 39 years. He also founded and managed the DuPont Quality Management & Technology Center.''Quality Digest Magazine'', August 1997
/ref> In 1963 he published his famous paper "algorithm for least-squares estimation of nonlinear problems" in

SIAM Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 mi ...

journal. Marquardt developed his algorithm to solve fitting nonlinear chemical models to laboratory data. In 1975 he was elected as a

Fellow of the American Statistical Association Like many other academic professional societies, the American Statistical Association (ASA) uses the title of Fellow of the American Statistical Association as its highest honorary grade of membership. The number of new fellows per year is limited ...

. As manager of the DuPont Applied Statistics Group, he led development of the Product Quality Management methodology and computer systems that implemented the company's continuous improvement initiatives from the mid-1970s to the late 1990s. He won the

Shewhart Medal The Shewhart Medal, named in honour of Walter A. Shewhart, is awarded annually by the American Society for Quality for ''...outstanding technical leadership in the field of modern quality control, especially through the development to its theory, ...

in 1986. In 1991, he established his own company, Donald W. Marquardt and Associates, which provides consulting and training in quality management, quality assurance, ISO 9000 standards, applied statistics, strategic planning and organizational change. He died from a heart attack at the age of 68.

Awards and achievements

President of the American Statistical Association The president of the American Statistical Association is the head of the American Statistical Association (ASA). According to the association's bylaws, the president is an officer, and a member of the board of directors and of the executive commit ...

(1986) * Elected member of the

International Statistical Institute The International Statistical Institute (ISI) is a professional association of statisticians. It was founded in 1885, although there had been international statistical congresses since 1853. The institute has about 4,000 elected members from gov ...

. * Leader of the U.S. delegation to the ISO 9000 International Quality Standard writing group. * American Society for Quality (ASQ)

(1987) * American Statistical Association Statistician of the Year (1993–94) * American Statistical Association Founders Award (1995) *

American National Standards Institute The American National Standards Institute (ANSI ) is a private non-profit organization that oversees the development of voluntary consensus standards for products, services, processes, systems, and personnel in the United States. The organi ...

Meritorious Service Award

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Marquardt, Donald W. 1929 births 1997 deaths American statisticians Columbia University alumni University of Delaware alumni Presidents of the American Statistical Association Elected Members of the International Statistical Institute 20th-century American mathematicians Fellows of the American Statistical Association