Benjamin Weiss
Benjamin Weiss | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1941 New York City, United States |
| Nationality | American, Israeli |
| Alma mater | Yeshiva University (B.A., M.A., 1962), Princeton University (Ph.D., 1965) |
| Occupation | Mathematician |
| Known for | Contributions to ergodic theory, topological dynamics, probability theory, game theory, and descriptive set theory |
Benjamin Weiss (; born 1941) is a mathematician holding dual American and Israeli nationality, noted for his contributions to ergodic theory, topological dynamics, probability theory, game theory, and descriptive set theory.
Biography
Weiss was born in New York City and completed both his B.A. and M.A. degrees at Yeshiva University in 1962. He earned his doctorate from Princeton University in 1965, studying under the supervision of William Feller.
Academic career
Between 1965 and 1967, Weiss was employed at IBM Research. In 1967, he became a faculty member at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where he held the Miriam and Julius Vinik Chair in Mathematics from 1990 until his retirement as emeritus professor in 2009. His academic appointments also included visiting roles at institutions such as Stanford, the MSRI, and IBM.
Throughout his career, Weiss has published over 180 scholarly articles spanning topics like ergodic theory, topological dynamics, orbit equivalence, probability, information theory, game theory, and descriptive set theory. Among his significant achievements are the introduction of Markov partitions alongside Roy Adler, pioneering work on the ergodic theory of amenable groups with Don Ornstein, co-development of the concept of mean dimension with Elon Lindenstrauss, and the formulation of sofic subshifts and sofic groups. Additionally, he proposed the road coloring conjecture in collaboration with Adler.
One of Weiss’s notable doctoral students is Fields Medal recipient Elon Lindenstrauss.
Awards and recognition
Weiss was invited to speak at the International Congress of Mathematicians in 1974 and gave presentations at the Conference Board of Mathematical Sciences meetings in 1979 and 1995. In 1998, he delivered the M.B. Porter Distinguished Lecture Series at Rice University. His honors include election as a Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2000, receipt of the prestigious Rothschild Prize in Mathematics in 2006, and being named a Fellow of the American Mathematical Society in 2012.
See also
- Daniel Rudolph – collaborator in academic research
- Living people
- Israeli mathematicians
- American mathematicians
- Dynamical systems theorists
- Probability theorists
- Game theorists
- Yeshiva University alumni
- Princeton University alumni
- Academic staff of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem
- Fellows of the American Mathematical Society
- 1941 births
- Jewish scientists
- Mathematicians from New York (state)
- Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
- 21st-century mathematicians
- 20th-century mathematicians
- IBM employees
- Stanford University faculty