Professor Anthony John Grenville Hey (born 17 August 1946) was Vice-President of Microsoft Research Connections, a division of Microsoft Research, until his departure in 2014.

Education

Hey was educated at

King Edward's School, Birmingham King Edward's School (KES) is an independent day school for boys in the British public school tradition, located in Edgbaston, Birmingham. Founded by King Edward VI in 1552, it is part of the Foundation of the Schools of King Edward VI in Bir ...

and the

University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...

. He graduated with a

Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...

degree in

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

in 1967, and a Doctor of Philosophy in

theoretical physics Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that employs mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental physics, which uses experim ...

in 1970 supervised by P. K. Kabir. He was a student of Worcester College, Oxford and St John's College, Oxford.

Career and research

From 1970 through 1972 Hey was a

postdoctoral fellow A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). The ultimate goal of a postdoctoral research position is to p ...

California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech or CIT)The university itself only spells its short form as "Caltech"; the institution considers other spellings such a"Cal Tech" and "CalTech" incorrect. The institute is also occasional ...

(Caltech). Moving to Pasadena, California, he worked with

Richard Feynman Richard Phillips Feynman (; May 11, 1918 – February 15, 1988) was an American theoretical physicist, known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, the physics of the superfl ...

and

Murray Gell-Mann Murray Gell-Mann (; September 15, 1929 – May 24, 2019) was an American physicist who received the 1969 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work on the theory of elementary particles. He was the Robert Andrews Millikan Professor of Theoretical ...

, both winners of the

Nobel Prize in Physics ) , image = Nobel Prize.png , alt = A golden medallion with an embossed image of a bearded man facing left in profile. To the left of the man is the text "ALFR•" then "NOBEL", and on the right, the text (smaller) "NAT•" then " ...

. He then moved to

Geneva, Switzerland Geneva ( ; french: Genève ) frp, Genèva ; german: link=no, Genf ; it, Ginevra ; rm, Genevra is the second-most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich) and the most populous city of Romandy, the French-speaking part of Switzerland. Situa ...

and worked as a fellow at CERN (the European organisation for nuclear research) for two years. Hey worked about thirty years as an academic at

University of Southampton , mottoeng = The Heights Yield to Endeavour , type = Public research university , established = 1862 – Hartley Institution1902 – Hartley University College1913 – Southampton University Coll ...

, starting in 1974 as a particle physicist. He spent 1978 as a visiting fellow at

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

. For 1981 he returned to Caltech as a visiting research professor. There he learned of

Carver Mead Carver Andress Mead (born May 1, 1934) is an American scientist and engineer. He currently holds the position of Gordon and Betty Moore Professor Emeritus of Engineering and Applied Science at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), ...

's work on very-large-scale integration and become interested in applying parallel computing techniques to large-scale scientific simulations. Hey worked with British semiconductor company Inmos on the

Transputer The transputer is a series of pioneering microprocessors from the 1980s, intended for parallel computing. To support this, each transputer had its own integrated memory and serial communication links to exchange data with other transputers. T ...

project in the 1980s. He switched to

computer science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to practical disciplines (includi ...

in 1985, and in 1986 became professor of computation in the Department of Electronics and Computer Science at Southampton. While there, he was promoted to Head of the School of Electronics and Computer Science in 1994 and Dean of Engineering and Applied Science in 1999. Among his work was "doing research on

Unix Unix (; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multiuser computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, an ...

with tools like

LaTeX Latex is an emulsion (stable dispersion) of polymer microparticles in water. Latexes are found in nature, but synthetic latexes are common as well. In nature, latex is found as a milky fluid found in 10% of all flowering plants (angiosperms ...

." In 1990 he was a visiting fellow at the

Thomas J. Watson Research Center The Thomas J. Watson Research Center is the headquarters for IBM Research. The center comprises three sites, with its main laboratory in Yorktown Heights, New York, U.S., 38 miles (61 km) north of New York City, Albany, New York and wit ...

IBM Research IBM Research is the research and development division for IBM, an American multinational information technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, with operations in over 170 countries. IBM Research is the largest industrial research or ...

. He then worked with

Jack Dongarra Jack Joseph Dongarra (born July 18, 1950) is an American computer scientist and mathematician. He is the American University Distinguished Professor of Computer Science in the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science Department at the Unive ...

, Rolf Hempel and David Walker, to define the Message Passing Interface (MPI) which became a de facto open standard for parallel scientific computing. In 1998 he was a visiting research fellow at

Los Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos National Laboratory (often shortened as Los Alamos and LANL) is one of the sixteen research and development laboratories of the United States Department of Energy (DOE), located a short distance northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico, ...

in the USA. Hey led the UK's e-Science Programme from March 2001 to June 2005. He was appointed corporate vice-president of technical computing at

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...

on 27 June 2005. Later he became corporate vice-president of external research, and in 2011 corporate vice-president of Microsoft Research Connections until his departure in 2014. Since 2015, he is a Senior Data Science Fellow at the University of Washington eScience Institute. Hey is the editor of the journal ''Concurrency and Computation: Practice and Experience''. Among other scientific advisory boards in Europe and the United States, he is a member of the

Global Grid Forum The Open Grid Forum (OGF) is a community of users, developers, and vendors for standardization of grid computing. It was formed in 2006 in a merger of the Global Grid Forum and the Enterprise Grid Alliance. The OGF models its process on the I ...

(GGF) Advisory Committee.

Publications

Hey has authored or co-authored a number of books including ''The Fourth Paradigm: Data-Intensive Scientific Discovery'', ''The Quantum Universe'' and ''The New Quantum Universe'', ''The Feynman Lectures on Computation'' and ''Einstein's Mirror''. Hey has also authored numerous peer-reviewed journal papers. His latest book is a popular book on computer science called ''The Computing Universe: A Journey through a Revolution''.The Computing Universe: A Journey through a Revolution published by Cambridge University Press in 2015

Awards and honours

Hey had an open scholarship to Worcester College, Oxford, from 1963 to 1967, won the Scott Prize for Physics in 1967, senior scholarship to St John's College, Oxford, in 1968 and was a

Harkness Fellow The Harkness Fellowship (previously known as the Commonwealth Fund Fellowship) is a program run by the Commonwealth Fund of New York City. This fellowship was established to reciprocate the Rhodes Scholarships and enable Fellows from several coun ...

from 1970 through 1972. Hey was made a Commander of the

Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(CBE) in 2005. He was elected a

Fellow A fellow is a concept whose exact meaning depends on context. In learned or professional societies, it refers to a privileged member who is specially elected in recognition of their work and achievements. Within the context of higher education ...

of the British Computer Society (FBCS) in 1996, the

Institute of Physics The Institute of Physics (IOP) is a UK-based learned society and professional body that works to advance physics education, research and application. It was founded in 1874 and has a worldwide membership of over 20,000. The IOP is the Physic ...

(FInstP) and the

Institution of Electrical Engineers The Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) was a British professional organisation of electronics, electrical, manufacturing, and Information Technology professionals, especially electrical engineers. It began in 1871 as the Society of T ...

in 1996 and the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng) in 2001. In 2006 he presented the prestigious IET

Pinkerton Lecture The Pinkerton lecture series is held by the Institution of Engineering and Technology in commemoration and honour of John Pinkerton, the pivotal engineer who was involved with designing the UK's first business computer in 1951. The first lecture was ...

. In 2007 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Civil Law degree from Newcastle University. In 2017 he was elected a Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM)..

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hey, Tony E-Science English physicists English science writers Living people Harkness Fellows Fellows of the British Computer Society Fellows of the Institute of Physics Fellows of the Institution of Engineering and Technology Fellows of the Royal Academy of Engineering Fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery 1946 births Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Academics of the University of Southampton Alumni of Worcester College, Oxford People associated with CERN