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The 25th anniversary of IEEE Canadian Conference on Electrical and Computer Engineering is less than a week away (http://www.ccece2012.org).  We have an exciting program with the following highlights:

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Lifetime Achievement: Ivo M. Babuska

from Notices of the American Mathematical Society
http://www.ams.org/notices/201204/rtx120400563p.pdf

Citation

The 2012 Steele Prize for Lifetime Achievement is awarded to
Ivo M. Babuska for his many pioneering advances in the
numerical solution of partial differential equations over the
last half century.

In his work on finite element methods, Babu¡sk a has developed
and applied mathematics in profound ways to develop, analyze,
and validate algorithms which are crucial for computational
science and engineering. In so doing, he has helped to define
that field and has had a great impact on the modern world.

A constant characteristic of Babuska's work is the combination
of deep and imaginative mathematical analysis with a constant
concern for the practical implications of his work for
engineering applications. In seminal work of the 1960s and
1970s, he established the mathematical foundations of the
finite element method culminating in a monumental and highly
influential treatise coauthored with Aziz in 1972. In this
early work he established the essential role of stability of
Galerkin methods and formulated the discrete inf-sup condition,
later to be named the Babuska-Brezzi condition, and developed
the approximation theory of finite element spaces. He also
introduced many techniques of lasting importance, such as the
imposition of Dirichlet boundary conditions through Lagrange
multipliers and through penalties, analysis through
mesh-dependent norms, the first studies of a posteriori error
estimation, and the Babuska-Rheinboldt theory of adaptivity.
The Babuska paradox for elastic plates, which shows strikingly
that the deformation of a circular elastic plate is not well
approximated by the deformation of even a nearly equal
polygonal plate, has inspired important developments in
mechanics, partial differential equations, and numerical
methods.

Babuska is an exceptionally productive author, collaborator,
and mentor. He has published over 350 refereed journal articles
and 26 books, has had nearly 150 coauthors, and has advised 40
Ph.D. students. An astounding feature of Babuska's work is how
many themes he initiated [that] grew into large and active
research fields. In the mid-1970s Babu¡ska was among the
pioneers of homogenization, which aims to capture the
large-scale effects of fine-scale features of materials without
resolving them. Later he developed generalized finite element
methods with J. E. Osborn which sought to capture the influence
of subgrid scale features in computational methods and
anticipated a large and currently active branch of research in
multiscale numerical methods. In the late 1980s Babuska and
collaborators developed the p-version of the finite element
method, and later the hp-method, and developed an elaborate
theory for understanding its convergence in the presence of
singularities. His important work in dimensional reduction and
hierarchical models also dates from this time. In the 1990s, he
developed the partition-of-unity finite element method, which
led to another large and active area of development on meshless
methods. In this century he has led the way to the computation
of partial differential equations with uncertain data and the
booming field of uncertainty quantification.

Ivo M. Babuska is among the foremost numerical analysts of all
time and a unique leader in applied mathematics. His many
contributions have had a lasting impact on mathematics,
engineering, science, and industry. The Steele Prize honors him
for all of these achievements.

Biographical Sketch

Ivo Babuska was born 1926 in Prague, Czechoslovakia. He
received his civil engineering degree (Ing.) and his Ph.D.
degree from the Czech Technical University in Prague. After
that he studied mathematics and received a Ph.D. (then called a
Candidate of Science, C.Sc., degree as in the USSR) and then
the doctorate degree (Doctor of Science, D.Sc.) in mathematics
from the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences. He worked in the
Mathematical Institute of the Academy and received the
Czechoslovak State Award for his scientific work in 1968.

In 1968 he came to the University of Maryland at College Park
as a visiting scientist, where he then became a professor in
the mathematics department. He retired from Maryland as
Distinguished University Professor in 1995.

Since 1995 he has been a senior scientist of the Institute for
Computational Engineering and Sciences and professor of
aerospace engineering and engineering mechanics, holding the
Robert Trull Chair in Engineering at the University of Texas at
Austin. Now half retired, he is still working at the
university. Ivo Babuska has received various honors recognizing
his contributions. He has been awarded five honorary doctorate
degrees, was elected to the U.S. National Academy of
Engineering, the European Academy of Sciences, the Engineering
Academy of the Czech Republic, and the Learned Society of Czech
Republic. He is a fellow of SIAM and ICAM. Asteroid 36060 was
named Babuska. He also received various recognitions, including
the Birkhoff Prize of SIAM and the AMS, the ICAM Congress
Medal, and the Bolzano Medal.

Response from Ivo Babuska

I am deeply honored to receive the Steele Prize for Lifetime
Achievement from the AMS because my work encompasses both
mathematics and engineering applications and computations. I am
very fortunate that many of my mathematical results are used
widely in engineering and practical computations. It is very
satisfactory and important to me that my mathematical results
are appreciated by both the mathematical and engineering
communities and [that] they are also used in practice. This was
influenced by my combined education in engineering and
mathematics and by my mentors, Professor Faltus in engineering,
Professor E. Cech, the well-known topologist, and Professor F.
Vycichlo, to whom I am very grateful. On this occasion, I would
like to thank all my scientific collaborators and friends in
the mathematics and engineering communities. I cannot list them
all, so I will mention here only a very few: J. Osborn, J.
Whiteman, J. T. Oden, and B. Szabo, and my students with whom I
have enjoyed not only doing mathematics but also hiking,
skiing, and various excursions and adventures.

Finally, I would like to thank very much the selection
committee for this great honor.

About the Prize

The Steele Prizes were established in 1970 in honor of George
David Birkhoff, William Fogg Osgood, and William Caspar
Graustein. Osgood was president of the AMS during 1905-06, and
Birkhoff served in that capacity during 1925-26. The prizes are
endowed under the terms of a bequest from Leroy P. Steele. Up
to three prizes are awarded each year in the following
categories: (1) Lifetime Achievement: for the cumulative
influence of the total mathematical work of the recipient, high
level of research over a period of time, particular influence
on the development of a field, and influence on mathematics
through Ph.D. students; (2) Mathematical Exposition: for a book
or substantial survey or expository research paper; (3) Seminal
Contribution to Research: for a paper, whether recent or not,
that has proved to be of fundamental or lasting importance in
its field or a model of important research. Each Steele Prize
carries a cash award of US$5,000.

Beginning with the 1994 prize, there has been a five-year cycle
of fields for the Seminal Contribution to Research Award. For
the 2012 prize, the field was geometry/topology. The Steele
Prizes are awarded by the AMS Council acting on the
recommendation of a selection committee. For the 2012 prizes,
the members of the selection committee were Peter S.
Constantin, Yakov Eliashberg, John E. Fornaess, Irene M. Gamba,
Barbara L. Keyfitz, Joel A. Smoller, Terence C. Tao, Akshay
Venkatesh, and Lai-Sang Young. The list of previous recipients
of the Steele Prize may be found on the AMS website at
http://www.ams.org/prizes-awards.