Robert Gary Bland (born February 25, 1948) is an American
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
operations research
Operations research ( en-GB, operational research) (U.S. Air Force Specialty Code: Operations Analysis), often shortened to the initialism OR, is a discipline that deals with the development and application of analytical methods to improve deci ...
er, a professor of operations research and information engineering at
Cornell University
Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...
.Faculty profile Cornell University, retrieved 2012-02-25. He was born in New York City.
Bland did both his undergraduate and graduate studies at
Cornell University
Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...
, earning a bachelor's degree in 1969, M.S. in 1972, and a Ph.D. in 1974 under the supervision of
D. R. Fulkerson
Delbert Ray Fulkerson (; August 14, 1924 – January 10, 1976) was an American mathematician who co-developed the FordFulkerson algorithm, one of the most well-known algorithms to solve the maximum flow problem in Flow network, networks.
Early l ...
. He began his faculty career at
Binghamton University
The State University of New York at Binghamton (Binghamton University or SUNY Binghamton) is a public university, public research university with campuses in Binghamton, New York, Binghamton, Vestal, New York, Vestal, and Johnson City, New Yor ...
, but then returned to Cornell in 1978.
Bland is known as one of the inventors of
oriented matroid
An oriented matroid is a mathematics, mathematical mathematical structure, structure that abstracts the properties of directed graphs, Vector space, vector arrangements over ordered fields, and Arrangement of hyperplanes, hyperplane arrangements o ...
s, which he used to define
Bland's rule In mathematical optimization, Bland's rule (also known as Bland's algorithm, Bland's anti-cycling rule or Bland's pivot rule) is an algorithmic refinement of the simplex method for linear optimization.
With Bland's rule, the simplex algorithm solve ...
for avoiding cycles in the
simplex method
In mathematical optimization, Dantzig's simplex algorithm (or simplex method) is a popular algorithm for linear programming.
The name of the algorithm is derived from the concept of a simplex and was suggested by T. S. Motzkin. Simplices are ...
for
linear programming
Linear programming (LP), also called linear optimization, is a method to achieve the best outcome (such as maximum profit or lowest cost) in a mathematical model whose requirements are represented by linear function#As a polynomial function, li ...
. Page 150 "It seems fair to say that the major credit for the origination of oriented matroid theory should be shared by Robert Bland,
Jon Folkman
Jon Hal Folkman (December 8, 1938 – January 23, 1969) was an American mathematician, a student of John Milnor, and a researcher at the RAND Corporation.
Schooling
Folkman was a Putnam Fellow in 1960. He received his Ph.D. in 1964 from Pri ...
,
Michel Las Vergnas
Michel Las Vergnas (11 January 1941 – 19 January 2013) was a French mathematician associated with Pierre-and-Marie-Curie University in Paris, and a research director emeritus at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique.page 418