Daubechies, Ingrid (1954–)

views updated

Daubechies, Ingrid (1954–)

Belgian-born American mathematician. Born 1954 in Belgium; dau. of Marcel (civil-mining engineer) and Simone Daubechies (criminologist); Free University of Brussels, BS, 1975, PhD in physics, 1980; m. Robert Calderbank, 1987 (mathematician); children: Michael and Carolyn.

Taught at Free University of Brussels for 12 years (1975–87); while attending conference in Montreal, Canada (1987), made important discoveries about wavelets, then relocated to US soon after; served as technical staff member at Mathematics Research Center of AT&T Bell Laboratories (1987–94), where she became a leading authority on wavelet theory; served as professor in mathematics department at Rutgers University (1991–94); was fellow of John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation (1992–97); at Princeton University, served as professor in math department and professor and director in Program in Applied and Computational Mathematics (1997–2001); was the 1st woman to win the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) Award in Mathematics (2000) "for fundamental discoveries on wavelets and wavelet expansions and for her role in making wavelets methods a practical basic tool of applied mathematics." Other awards include Louis Empain Prize for Physics (1984), Steele Prize for Exposition from American Mathematical Society for her book Ten Lectures on Wavelets (1994), and Ruth Lyttle Satter Prize in Mathematics from American Mathematical Society (1997).

More From encyclopedia.com