Robert Elias Schapire is an American

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 ...

, former David M. Siegel '83 Professor in the

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 ...

department at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

, and has recently moved to

Microsoft Research Microsoft Research (MSR) is the research subsidiary of Microsoft. It was created in 1991 by Richard Rashid, Bill Gates and Nathan Myhrvold with the intent to advance state-of-the-art computing and solve difficult world problems through technologi ...

. His primary specialty is theoretical and applied

machine learning Machine learning (ML) is a field of inquiry devoted to understanding and building methods that 'learn', that is, methods that leverage data to improve performance on some set of tasks. It is seen as a part of artificial intelligence. Machine ...

. His work led to the development of the boosting ensemble algorithm used in machine learning. His PhD dissertation, ''The design and analysis of efficient learning algorithms'', won him the

ACM Doctoral Dissertation Award The ACM Doctoral Dissertation Award is awarded annually by the Association for Computing Machinery to the authors of the best doctoral dissertations in computer science and computer engineering. The award is accompanied by a prize of US $20,000 ...

in 1991. Together with

Yoav Freund Joab (Hebrew Modern: ''Yōʼav'', Tiberian: ''Yōʼāḇ'') the son of Zeruiah, was the nephew of King David and the commander of his army, according to the Hebrew Bible. Name The name Joab is, like many other Hebrew names, theophoric - der ...

, he invented the

AdaBoost AdaBoost, short for ''Adaptive Boosting'', is a statistical classification meta-algorithm formulated by Yoav Freund and Robert Schapire in 1995, who won the 2003 Gödel Prize for their work. It can be used in conjunction with many other types of ...

algorithm in 1996. They both received the

Gödel prize The Gödel Prize is an annual prize for outstanding papers in the area of theoretical computer science, given jointly by the European Association for Theoretical Computer Science (EATCS) and the Association for Computing Machinery Special Inter ...

in 2003 for this work. In 2014, Schapire was elected a member of the

National Academy of Engineering The National Academy of Engineering (NAE) is an American nonprofit, non-governmental organization. The National Academy of Engineering is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy ...

for his contributions to machine learning through the invention and development of boosting algorithms. In 2016, he was elected to the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

Personal life

His son, Zachary Schapire, recently graduated from his alma mater,

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

. His daughter, Jeni Schapire, is a singer-songwriter in

Nashville, TN Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the county seat, seat of Davidson County, Tennessee, Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the List of muni ...

and a graduate of

Oberlin College Oberlin College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college and conservatory of music in Oberlin, Ohio. It is the oldest Mixed-sex education, coeducational liberal arts college in the United S ...

. He is a self-proclaimed vegetarian.

Selected works

Books

References

External links

Robert Schapire's home page
Gödel Prize laureates Princeton University faculty Living people Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Year of birth missing (living people) {{US-compu-bio-stub Brown University alumni