was a Japanese

statistician A statistician is a person who works with theoretical or applied statistics. The profession exists in both the private and public sectors. It is common to combine statistical knowledge with expertise in other subjects, and statisticians may wor ...

. In the early 1970s, he formulated the Akaike information criterion (AIC). AIC is now widely used for model selection, which is commonly the most difficult aspect of

statistical inference Statistical inference is the process of using data analysis to infer properties of an underlying probability distribution, distribution of probability.Upton, G., Cook, I. (2008) ''Oxford Dictionary of Statistics'', OUP. . Inferential statistical ...

; additionally, AIC is the basis of a paradigm for the foundations of statistics. Akaike also made major contributions to the study of time series. As well, he had a large role in the general development of statistics in Japan.

Akaike information criterion

The Akaike information criterion (AIC) is an estimator of the relative quality of

statistical model A statistical model is a mathematical model that embodies a set of statistical assumptions concerning the generation of Sample (statistics), sample data (and similar data from a larger Statistical population, population). A statistical model repres ...

s for a given set of data. Given a collection of models for the data, AIC estimates the quality of each model, relative to each of the other models. Thus, AIC provides a means for model selection. AIC was first formally described in a research paper by . As of October 2014, the paper had received more than 14000 citations in the Web of Science: making it the 73rd most-cited research paper of all time. (As of April 2016, the paper had received about 17000 citations.) Nowadays, AIC has become common enough that it is often used without citing Akaike's 1974 paper. Indeed, there are over 170,000 scholarly articles/books that use AIC (as assessed by Google Scholar).

Life and career

Hirotugu Akaike was born to a silkworm farmer in Fujinomiya City; he was the youngest of four brothers.
text
at Tong's website. In 1957, he married Ayako, with whom he afterward had three daughters; Ayako died (of subarachnoid haemorrhage) in 1983. He later married Mitsuko, who remained his wife for the rest of his life. Akaike graduated with a bachelor's degree from the School of Science at the University of Tokyo, in 1952.C.V.
, Hirotugu Akaike Memorial Website (

Institute of Statistical Mathematics An institute is an organisational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations (research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body. In some countries, institutes can ...

). He then became a researcher at the

. In 1961, obtained his Doctor of Science, in mathematics, from the University of Tokyo. Afterward, he continued researching at the institute; much of his research pertained to time series, where he made major contributions. From 1986 until 1994, when he retired, he was director general of the institute. In 1988, he founded the Department of Statistical Science at the

Graduate University for Advanced Studies is one of the national universities of Japan, headquartered in Shonan Village (湘南国際村) in the town of Hayama in Kanagawa Prefecture. , as it is generally called in its abbreviated form, was established in 1988, with Dr. Saburo Nagakur ...

; he was chair of the department from the founding until his retirement in 1994.Kitagawa, Genshiro (2011),
Contribution of Prof. H. Akaike to Statistical Modeling of Complex Systems
,
58th World Statistics Congress
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 ...

''. From 1994 until his death, he was an emeritus professor at both the institute and the Graduate University. During his career, Akaike held visiting positions at a number of universities: Princeton (1966–1967),

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is considere ...

(1967, 1979), Hawaii (1972), the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (1973),

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

(Vinton Hayes Senior Fellow in Engineering and Applied Physics, 1976), Wisconsin–Madison (Mathematics Research Center, 1982), and several Japanese universities. He was also president of the Japan Statistical Society.JSS Research Series in Statistics
, Springer. Additionally, he served as a Member of the Science Council of Japan. Akaike died of pneumonia. His obituary in the '' Journal of the Royal Statistical Society'' describes him as being "a most gentle person of great intellect, integrity and generosity".

Awards, honors, and related

In 1989, Akaike was awarded the Asahi Prize and the Purple Ribbon Medal. In 1996, he was the recipient of the first Japan Statistical Society Prize. In 2000, he was awarded the Gold and Silver Star of the

Order of the Sacred Treasure The is a Japanese order, established on 4 January 1888 by Emperor Meiji as the Order of Meiji. Originally awarded in eight classes (from 8th to 1st, in ascending order of importance), since 2003 it has been awarded in six classes, the lowest ...

. In 2006, Akaike was awarded the Kyoto Prize; the official citation states that the Prize was for his "Major contribution to statistical science and modeling with the development of the Akaike Information Criterion (AIC)". Akaike was a Fellow at several scientific associations: American Statistical Association,

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operation ...

, Institute of Mathematical Statistics, Royal Statistical Society, and others.. The Akaike Memorial Lecture was founded to honor Akaike's legacy. The Lecture is biennial, and is sponsored jointly by the Institute of Statistical Mathematics and the Japan Statistical Society.. On 5 November 2017, Google Doodle commemorated his 90th birthday.

Interviews

*. *. *
Message from Hirotugu Akaike - The 2006 Kyoto Prize Winner
— YouTube video, recorded on November 11, 2006.

Publications

Articles

A list of Akaike's research articles (and similar publications) is available on the Hirotugu Akaike Memorial Website, at the

. The list comprises 119 English articles and 52 Japanese articles. What follows here is a selection of English articles. (Many articles in what follows are also in the book ''Selected Papers of Hirotugu Akaike''..) *. *. *; republished in . *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *Akaike, H. (1980). "Likelihood and the Bayes procedure (with discussion)". J. M. Bernardo, M. H. DeGroot, D. V. Lindley, and A. F. M. Smith (eds.)
Bayesian Statistics
', 143–203. Valencia, Spain: University Press. *. *Akaike, H. (1981). "Modern development of statistical methods". P. Eykhoff (ed.) ''Trends and Progress in System Identification'', 169–184. Pergamon Press. *Akaike, H. (1983). "Statistical inference and measurement of entropy".

G. E. P. Box George Edward Pelham Box (18 October 1919 – 28 March 2013) was a British statistician, who worked in the areas of quality control, time-series analysis, design of experiments, and Bayesian inference. He has been called "one of the gre ...

, T. Leonard, and C.-F. Wu (eds.) ''Scientific Inference, Data Analysis, and Robustness'', 165–189. Academic Press. *Akaike, H. (1983). "Information measures and model selection". ''Proceedings of the 44th World Statistics Congress of the

'', 277–291. *. *Akaike, H. (1985). "Prediction and entropy". A. C. Atkinson, and S. E. Fienberg (eds.) ''A Celebration of Statistics'', 1–24. Springer. *. *.

Books

The following list is adapted from a list on the Hirotugu Akaike Memorial Website, at the

.Books
, Hirotugu Akaike Memorial Website (

). * ''Akaike Information Criterion AIC - Modeling / Prediction / Knowledge-Discovery'' (written in Japanese)
Co-authored with S. Amari, G. Kitagawa, S. Abashima, and H. Simodaira, and with K. Murota and T.i Tsuchiya (Eds.), Tokyo: Kyoritsu Shuppan (2007). * ''The Practice of Time Series Analysis''
H. Akaike and G. Kitagawa (Eds.), Springer-Verlag (1999). * ''Practice of Time Series Analysis II'' (written in Japanese)
H. Akaike and G. Kitagawa (Eds.), Asakura Publishing Co. (1995). * ''Time Series Theory'' (written in Japanese)
coauthored with T. Ozaki, The Society for the Promotion of The University of the Air (1988). * ''Statistical Analysis and Control of Dynamic Systems'' (translation of 1972 book)
coauthored with T. Nakagawa, Kluwer Academic Publishers (1988). * ''Statistics in Science'' (written in Japanese)
coauthored with T. Matsuda, M. Oda, K. Nomoto, E. Matsunaga Kodansha Ltd. (1987). * ''Statistical Special Theory'' (written in Japanese)
coauthored with C. Hayashi and T. Suzuki, The Society for the Promotion of The University of the Air (1986). * ''Probability and Statistics'' (written in Japanese)
coauthored with C. Hayashi, The Society for the Promotion of The University of the Air (1985). * ''Statistical Analysis and Control of Dynamic Systems'' (written in Japanese)
coauthored with T. Nakagawa, Science Co. (1972). * ''Idea Concerning Public Opinion'' (written in Japanese)
coauthored with M. Royama, New Japan Educational Association (1955). * ''Contemporary Society and Mass Communication'' (written in Japanese)
Mass Communication Course Vol.5 (coauthored with R. Hidaka), Kawade Shobo Publishers (1955).

References

External links

Hirotugu Akaike , 2006 Laureate
—official web page for Akaike's Kyoto Prize
Hirotugu Akaike Memorial Website
—at the

{{DEFAULTSORT:Akaike Hirotugu 1927 births 2009 deaths 20th-century Japanese mathematicians 21st-century Japanese mathematicians Fellow Members of the IEEE Fellows of the American Statistical Association Fellows of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics Fellows of the Royal Statistical Society Japanese statisticians Kyoto laureates in Basic Sciences People from Fujinomiya, Shizuoka Recipients of the Order of the Sacred Treasure, 2nd class University of Tokyo alumni