George Lann Nemhauser (born 1937). is an American

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 decis ...

er, the A. Russell Chandler III Chair and Institute Professor of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and the former president of the

Operations Research Society of America The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is an international society for practitioners in the fields of operations research (O.R.), management science, and analytics. It was established in 1995 with the merger o ...

.ORSA Presidential Portrait Gallery: George L. Nemhauser
retrieved 2012-02.25.

Biography

Nemhauser was born in

The Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

, New York, and did his undergraduate education at the City College of New York, graduating with a degree in

chemical engineering Chemical engineering is an engineering field which deals with the study of operation and design of chemical plants as well as methods of improving production. Chemical engineers develop economical commercial processes to convert raw materials int ...

in 1958. He earned his Ph.D. in operations research in 1961 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 ...

, under the supervision of Jack Mitten. He taught at

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...

from 1961 to 1969, and then moved to

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 tea ...

, where he held the Leon C. Welch endowed chair in operations research. He moved to the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1985. He was president of ORSA in 1981, chair of the

Mathematical Programming Society The Mathematical Optimization Society (MOS), known as the Mathematical Programming Society until 2010,

Research

Nemhauser's research concerns large

mixed integer 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 relationships. Linear programming i ...

problems and their applications.. He is one of the co-inventors of the branch and price method for solving

integer linear program An integer programming problem is a mathematical optimization or feasibility program in which some or all of the variables are restricted to be integers. In many settings the term refers to integer linear programming (ILP), in which the objectiv ...

s. He also contributed important early studies of approximation algorithms for

facility location Facility location is a name given to several different problems in computer science and in game theory Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interactions among rational agents. Myerson, Roger B. (1991). ''Game Theory: A ...

problems and for submodular optimization. Nemhauser, together with Leslie Trotter, showed in 1975 that the optimal solution to the weighted

vertex cover In graph theory, a vertex cover (sometimes node cover) of a graph is a set of vertices that includes at least one endpoint of every edge of the graph. In computer science, the problem of finding a minimum vertex cover is a classical optimiza ...

problem contains all the nodes that have a value of 1 in the linear programming relaxation as well as some of the nodes that have a value of 0.5.

Books

Nemhauser is the author of *''Introduction to Dynamic Programming (Wiley, 1966) *''Integer Programming'' (with Robert Garfinkel, Wiley, 1972, ) *''Integer and Combinatorial Optimization'' (with Laurence A. Wolsey, Wiley, 1988, ). *''Optimization'' (with A. H. G. Rinnooy Kan and Michael J. Todd, North-Holland, 1989)

Awards and honors

Nemhauser was elected as 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 of ...

in 1986, a fellow of

INFORMS The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is an international society for practitioners in the fields of operations research (O.R.), management science, and analytics. It was established in 1995 with the merger o ...

in 2002, and a fellow of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics in 2008. He has won five awards from INFORMS: the

George E. Kimball Medal George Elbert Kimball (July 12, 1906 – December 6, 1967) was an American professor of quantum chemistry, and a pioneer of operations research algorithms during World War II. Early life George E. Kimball was born to Arthur G. Kimball in Chic ...

for distinguished service to INFORMS and to the profession in 1988, the Frederick W. Lanchester Prize in 1977 for a paper on approximation algorithms for

and again in 1989 for his textbook ''Integer and Combinatorial Optimization'', the Phillip McCord Morse Lectureship Award in 1992, the first Optimization Society Khachiyan Prize for Life-time Accomplishments in Optimization in 2010, and the

John von Neumann Theory Prize The John von Neumann Theory Prize of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is awarded annually to an individual (or sometimes a group) who has made fundamental and sustained contributions to theory in operat ...

in 2012 (together with Laurence Wolsey).
Announcement by INFORMS

References

External links

Biography of George Nemhauser
from the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences {{DEFAULTSORT:Nemhauser, George Lann 1937 births Living people American operations researchers City College of New York alumni Robert R. McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science alumni Johns Hopkins University faculty Georgia Tech faculty Cornell University faculty Fellows of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences Members of the United States National Academy of Engineering John von Neumann Theory Prize winners Scientists from the Bronx American chemical engineers