Lawrence L. Larmore is an

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

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, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

and

theoretical A theory is a rational type of abstract thinking about a phenomenon, or the results of such thinking. The process of contemplative and rational thinking is often associated with such processes as observational study or research. Theories may be s ...

computer scientist A computer scientist is a person who is trained in the academic study of computer science. Computer scientists typically work on the theoretical side of computation, as opposed to the hardware side on which computer engineers mainly focus (al ...

. Since 1994 he has been a professor of

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

at the

University of Nevada, Las Vegas The University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV) is a public land-grant research university in Paradise, Nevada. The campus is about east of the Las Vegas Strip. It was formerly part of the University of Nevada from 1957 to 1969. It includes the S ...

(UNLV). Larmore developed the

package-merge algorithm The package-merge algorithm is an '' O(nL)''-time algorithm for finding an optimal length-limited Huffman code for a given distribution on a given alphabet of size ''n'', where no code word is longer than ''L''. It is a greedy algorithm, and a gen ...

for the length-limited Huffman coding problem, as well as an algorithm for optimizing paragraph breaking in linear time. He is perhaps best known for his work with competitive analysis of

online algorithm In computer science, an online algorithm is one that can process its input piece-by-piece in a serial fashion, i.e., in the order that the input is fed to the algorithm, without having the entire input available from the start. In contrast, an o ...

s, particularly for the

k-server problem The -server problem is a problem of theoretical computer science in the category of online algorithms, one of two abstract problems on metric spaces that are central to the theory of competitive analysis (the other being metrical task systems). ...

. His contributions, with his co-author

Marek Chrobak Marek Chrobak is a full professor at University of California, Riverside. He is known for his work Competitive analysis (online algorithm), competitive analysis of online algorithms, particularly for the k-server problem, on information disseminatio ...

, led to the application of

T-theory T-theory is a branch of discrete mathematics dealing with analysis of trees and discrete metric spaces. General history T-theory originated from a question raised by Manfred Eigen in the late 1970s. He was trying to fit twenty distinct t-RNA molec ...

to the server problem. Larmore earned a Ph.D. in

Mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

in the field of

algebraic topology Algebraic topology is a branch of mathematics that uses tools from abstract algebra to study topological spaces. The basic goal is to find algebraic invariant (mathematics), invariants that classification theorem, classify topological spaces up t ...

from

Northwestern University Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston, Illinois. Founded in 1851, Northwestern is the oldest chartered university in Illinois and is ranked among the most prestigious academic institutions in the world. Charte ...

in 1965. He later earned a second Ph.D., this time in

Computer Science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical discipli ...

, in the field of

theoretical computer science Theoretical computer science (TCS) is a subset of general computer science and mathematics that focuses on mathematical aspects of computer science such as the theory of computation, lambda calculus, and type theory. It is difficult to circumsc ...

from

University of California, Irvine The University of California, Irvine (UCI or UC Irvine) is a public land-grant research university in Irvine, California. One of the ten campuses of the University of California system, UCI offers 87 undergraduate degrees and 129 graduate and pr ...

. He is a past member of

Institute for Advanced Study The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), located in Princeton, New Jersey, in the United States, is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholar ...

in Princeton, New Jersey and ''Gastwissenschaftler'' (visiting scholar) at the

University of Bonn The Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (german: Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn) is a public research university located in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the ( en, Rhine U ...

Awards

* NSF graduate fellowship (1961)

References

* * *

External links

Larmore's entry in the Mathematics Genealogy ProjectProfessor Larmore's research pageProfessor Larmore's Webpage at UNLV
{{DEFAULTSORT:Larmore, Lawrence L. American computer scientists 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians University of Nevada, Las Vegas faculty Academic staff of the University of Bonn Northwestern University alumni University of California, Irvine alumni Living people Year of birth missing (living people)