Erik Demaine

Erik Demaine (left), Martin Demaine (center), and Bill Spight (right) watch John Horton Conway do a card trick (2005)

Erik Duncan Demaine (born February 28, 1981 in Halifax (Nova Scotia) ) is a mathematician , computer scientist and artist .

He is a Canadian and American citizen. Since 2001 he has been a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts . His field of work includes mathematical origami , data structures and algorithmic geometry .

Scientific career

As a child, Erik received home schooling from his father Martin L. Demaine (* 1942), who is also a mathematician and artist. He attended Dalhousie University in Canada from 1993 to 1995 , where he obtained a Bachelor of Science degree at the age of 14 . From 1995 to 2001 he attended the University of Waterloo . There he received a Master of Mathematics degree in 1996 and his PhD in 2001 at the age of 20. After completing his doctorate, Erik Demaine became a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 2001, where he has been a member of the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory since then . He is the youngest professor to be appointed to MIT.

Erik Demaine is best known for his work in the field of mathematical origami. He also works in the areas of algorithms and data structures, algorithmic geometry, and graph theory . Some of his best known results are:

Every chain of joints in the plane can be unfolded into a straight line without overlapping (folding rule problem) (with Robert Connelly and Günter Rote ).
Each polygon can be cut out with a straight cut after a corresponding folding of a sheet of paper (fold-and-cut problem).
The generalized Rubik's Cube can be solved in moves (with Martin L. Demaine, Sarah Eisenstat, Anna Lubiw, and Andrew Winslow). ${\ displaystyle n \ times n \ times n}$ ${\ displaystyle \ Theta (n ^ {2} / \ log n)}$

Artistic creation

Together with his father Martin Demaine, Erik Demaine designed paper sculptures, which were part of the 2008 exhibition "Design and the Elastic Mind" at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York . The exhibits shown there have been included in the permanent collection of MoMA.

Prizes and awards

2003 Canadian Governor General's Gold Medal from the University of Waterloo and the NSERC Doctoral Prize (for his dissertation )
2003 MacArthur Foundation grant ( MacArthur Fellowship )
2013 Presburger Award for young scientists from the European Association for Theoretical Computer Science (EATCS)
2013 Guggenheim Memorial Foundation grant
2016 Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery

Others

In the documentary Between the Folds , Erik Demaine appears alongside 14 other origami artists.

Web links

Commons : Erik Demaine - collection of images, videos and audio files

official website (in English)
Erik Demaine in the Mathematics Genealogy Project
Biography in MIT News (in English)
Article about Erik Demaine on Zeit.de (2004)
We know a way to fold everything. FAZ , December 21, 2016.; accessed on March 21, 2019

Individual evidence

↑ Erik Demaine's Curriculum vitæ (PDF; 259 kB) Accessed July 22, 2013.

↑ Robert Connelly, Erik Demaine, Günter Rote: Straightening polygonal arcs and convexifying polygonal cycles . In: Discrete and Computational Geometry . 30, No. 2, 2003, pp. 205-239. Preliminary version appeared at 41st Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science, 2000. doi : 10.1007 / s00454-003-0006-7 .

↑ Erik Demaine, Joseph O'Rourke: Geometric Folding Algorithms: Linkages, Origami, Polyhedra . Cambridge University Press, July 2007, ISBN 978-0-521-85757-4 , pp. Part II.

↑ Erik D. Demaine, Martin L. Demaine, Sarah Eisenstat, Anna Lubiw, Andrew Winslow: Algorithms for Solving Rubik's Cubes . In: Algorithms - ESA 2011 - 19th Annual European Symposium, Saarbrücken., Pp. 689–700. doi : 10.1007 / 978-3-642-23719-5_58

↑ Curved Origami Sculpture . Retrieved July 24, 2013.

↑ Presburger Award 2013 . Retrieved February 15, 2013.

^ John Simon Guggenheim Foundation - Erik Demaine. In: gf.org. Retrieved February 12, 2016 .

^ Between the folds (documentary) . Retrieved July 24, 2013.

personal data
SURNAME	Demaine, Erik
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Demaine, Erik D.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	Canadian-American mathematician, computer scientist, and artist
DATE OF BIRTH	February 28, 1981
PLACE OF BIRTH	Halifax (Nova Scotia)

[cv-1] Erik Demaine's Curriculum vitæ (PDF; 259 kB) Accessed July 22, 2013.

[2] Robert Connelly, Erik Demaine, Günter Rote: Straightening polygonal arcs and convexifying polygonal cycles . In: Discrete and Computational Geometry . 30, No. 2, 2003, pp. 205-239. Preliminary version appeared at 41st Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science, 2000. doi : 10.1007 / s00454-003-0006-7 .

[GFALOP-3] Erik Demaine, Joseph O'Rourke: Geometric Folding Algorithms: Linkages, Origami, Polyhedra . Cambridge University Press, July 2007, ISBN 978-0-521-85757-4 , pp. Part II.

[4] Erik D. Demaine, Martin L. Demaine, Sarah Eisenstat, Anna Lubiw, Andrew Winslow: Algorithms for Solving Rubik's Cubes . In: Algorithms - ESA 2011 - 19th Annual European Symposium, Saarbrücken., Pp. 689–700. doi : 10.1007 / 978-3-642-23719-5_58

[5] Curved Origami Sculpture . Retrieved July 24, 2013.

[6] Presburger Award 2013 . Retrieved February 15, 2013.

[7] John Simon Guggenheim Foundation - Erik Demaine. In: gf.org. Retrieved February 12, 2016 .

[8] Between the folds (documentary) . Retrieved July 24, 2013.