Alexander Lubotzky (; born 28 June 1956) is an Israeli mathematician and former politician who is currently a professor at the

Weizmann Institute of Science The Weizmann Institute of Science ( ''Machon Weizmann LeMada'') is a Public university, public research university in Rehovot, Israel, established in 1934, fourteen years before the State of Israel was founded. Unlike other List of Israeli uni ...

and an adjunct professor at

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...

. He served as a member of the

Knesset The Knesset ( , ) is the Unicameralism, unicameral legislature of Israel. The Knesset passes all laws, elects the President of Israel, president and Prime Minister of Israel, prime minister, approves the Cabinet of Israel, cabinet, and supe ...

for The Third Way party between 1996 and 1999. In 2018 he won the

Israel Prize The Israel Prize (; ''pras israél'') is an award bestowed by the State of Israel, and regarded as the state's highest cultural honor. History Prior to the Israel Prize, the most significant award in the arts was the Dizengoff Prize and in Israel ...

for his accomplishments in mathematics and computer science.

Biography

Alexander (Alex) Lubotzky was born in

Tel Aviv Tel Aviv-Yafo ( or , ; ), sometimes rendered as Tel Aviv-Jaffa, and usually referred to as just Tel Aviv, is the most populous city in the Gush Dan metropolitan area of Israel. Located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline and with a popula ...

Holocaust survivor Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, its collaborators before and during World War II ...

s. His father, Iser Lubotzky was a

Partisan Partisan(s) or The Partisan(s) may refer to: Military * Partisan (military), paramilitary forces engaged behind the front line ** Francs-tireurs et partisans, communist-led French anti-fascist resistance against Nazi Germany during WWII ** Ital ...

Irgun The Irgun (), officially the National Military Organization in the Land of Israel, often abbreviated as Etzel or IZL (), was a Zionist paramilitary organization that operated in Mandatory Palestine between 1931 and 1948. It was an offshoot of th ...

officer and the legal advisor of

Herut Herut () was the major conservative nationalist political party in Israel from 1948 until its formal merger into Likud in 1988. It was an adherent of Revisionist Zionism. Some of their policies were compared to those of the Nazi party. Early y ...

. After school, Lubotzky did his IDF national service as a captain officer in a special intelligence and communication unit. He studied mathematics at

Bar-Ilan University Bar-Ilan University (BIU, , ''Universitat Bar-Ilan'') is a public research university in the Tel Aviv District city of Ramat Gan, Israel. Established in 1955, Bar Ilan is Israel's second-largest academic university institution. It has 20,000 ...

during highschool, gaining a BA (summa cum laude) and continuing directly with studying for his

PhD A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil; or ) is a terminal degree that usually denotes the highest level of academic achievement in a given discipline and is awarded following a course of graduate study and original research. The name of the deg ...

under the supervision of

Hillel Furstenberg Hillel "Harry" Furstenberg (; born September 29, 1935) is a German-born American-Israeli mathematician and professor emeritus at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He is a member of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities and U.S. Natio ...

. Lubotzky married Yardenna (daughter of Murray Roston), a lecturer in

Art History Art history is the study of Work of art, artistic works made throughout human history. Among other topics, it studies art’s formal qualities, its impact on societies and cultures, and how artistic styles have changed throughout history. Tradit ...

and English, in 1980. The couple had six children; the oldest,

Asael Lubotzky Asael Lubotzky (; born 21 January 1983) is an Israeli physician, author, and molecular biologist. Formerly an officer in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), he is a combat veteran of the Second Lebanon War. Military service Asael Lubotzky grew u ...

, was injured severely in the Battle of Bint Jbeil in Lebanon, while serving as an

officer An officer is a person who has a position of authority in a hierarchical organization. The term derives from Old French ''oficier'' "officer, official" (early 14c., Modern French ''officier''), from Medieval Latin ''officiarius'' "an officer," fro ...

in the IDF in the

2006 Lebanon war The 2006 Lebanon War was a 34-day armed conflict in Lebanon, fought between Hezbollah and Israel. The war started on 12 July 2006, and continued until a United Nations-brokered ceasefire went into effect in the morning on 14 August 2006, thoug ...

and after his rehabilitation became a physician.

Academic career

He worked as a professor of mathematics at the

Hebrew University The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. It is the second-ol ...

, becoming head of the department (1994–1996). He has been a visiting professor at the

Institute for Advanced Study The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry located in Princeton, New Jersey. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholars, including Albert Ein ...

Princeton Princeton University is a private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the Unit ...

Stanford Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth governor of and th ...

, and the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, or UChi) is a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its main campus is in the Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood on Chicago's South Side, Chic ...

, with visits at Columbia,

Yale Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, and one of the nine colonial colleges ch ...

NYU New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City, New York, United States. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded in 1832 by Albert Gallatin as a non-denominational all-male institutio ...

and

ETH Zurich ETH Zurich (; ) is a public university in Zurich, Switzerland. Founded in 1854 with the stated mission to educate engineers and scientists, the university focuses primarily on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. ETH Zurich ran ...

. Lubotzky holds a Maurice and Clara Weil Chair in mathematics at the

Einstein Institute of Mathematics The Einstein Institute of Mathematics () is a centre for scientific research in mathematics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, founded in 1925 with the opening of the university. A leading research institute, the institute's faculty has inclu ...

of the

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public university, public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. ...

. He is known for contributions to

geometric group theory Geometric group theory is an area in mathematics devoted to the study of finitely generated groups via exploring the connections between algebraic properties of such groups and topological and geometric properties of spaces on which these group ...

, the study of lattices in

Lie group In mathematics, a Lie group (pronounced ) is a group (mathematics), group that is also a differentiable manifold, such that group multiplication and taking inverses are both differentiable. A manifold is a space that locally resembles Eucli ...

s, representation theory of discrete groups and Kazhdan's property (T), the study of subgroup growth and applications of group theory to

combinatorics Combinatorics is an area of mathematics primarily concerned with counting, both as a means and as an end to obtaining results, and certain properties of finite structures. It is closely related to many other areas of mathematics and has many ...

and

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

( expander graphs) and

error correcting codes In computing, telecommunication, information theory, and coding theory, forward error correction (FEC) or channel coding is a technique used for controlling errors in data transmission over unreliable or noisy communication channels. The centra ...

. Lubotzky received the

Erdős Prize The Anna and Lajos Erdős Prize in Mathematics is a prize given by the Israel Mathematical Union to an Israeli mathematician (in any field of mathematics and computer science), "with preference to candidates up to the age of 40." The prize was e ...

in 1990. In the years 1994–1996 Lubotzky was the chairman of Einstein Institute of Mathematics at the

. In 1992 Lubotzky was a recipient of the Sunyer i Balaguer Prize from the Institut d'Estudis Catalans for his book "Discrete Groups Expanding Graphs and Invariant Measures" and again in 2002 with Dan Segal for their book "Subgroup Growth". In 2002 he has received the

Rothschild Prize Yad Hanadiv (The Rothschild Foundation) is a Rothschild family philanthropic foundation in Israel. Goals and objectives Yad Hanadiv defines its mission as: Dedicated to creating resources for advancing Israel as a healthy, vibrant, democratic so ...

in mathematics. Lubotzky is listed as an

ISI highly cited researcher The Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) was an academic publishing service, founded by Eugene Garfield in Philadelphia in 1956. ISI offered scientometric and bibliographic database services. Its specialty was citation indexing and analysis ...

in mathematics since 2003. Lubotzky was elected a foreign member of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (The Academy) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and other ...

in 2005. In 2005-6 He led in the

a year long program on "Pro-finite groups and the congruence subgroup problem". In 2006, he got an honorary degree from the

for his contribution to Modern

mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

. In 2008 Lubotzky received the

European Research Council The European Research Council (ERC) is a public body for funding of scientific and technological research conducted within the European Union (EU). Established by the European Commission in 2007, the ERC is composed of an independent Scientific ...

(ERC) advanced grant for exceptional established research leaders. In 2011 Lubotzky was chosen to be the keynote speaker at the joint meeting of the

American Mathematical Society The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meetings, ...

(AMS) and the

Mathematical Association of America The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) is a professional society that focuses on mathematics accessible at the undergraduate level. Members include university A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary edu ...

(MAA) in New Orleans. Lubotzky's keynote address in front of the conference's 6,000 attendees marked the first time that an Israeli was the keynote speaker at one of these conferences. In 2012 he was a visiting researcher at Microsoft Research Center. In 2021 he became a professor at the

Political career

A founding member of The

Third Way The Third Way is a predominantly centrist political position that attempts to reconcile centre-right and centre-left politics by advocating a varying synthesis of Right-wing economics, right-wing economic and Left-wing politics, left-wing so ...

in March 1996, he chaired its secretariat and was elected to the Knesset in the May 1996 elections. He served as a member of the Knesset's Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee; Constitution, Law and

Justice In its broadest sense, justice is the idea that individuals should be treated fairly. According to the ''Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy'', the most plausible candidate for a core definition comes from the ''Institutes (Justinian), Inst ...

Committee; Status of Women Committee and the Science and Technology Committee, and chaired the subcommittee on the

Y2K Bug The term year 2000 problem, or simply Y2K, refers to potential computer errors related to the formatting and storage of calendar data for dates in and after the year 2000. Many programs represented four-digit years with only the final two d ...

. As an MK, Lubotzky was mainly known for his compromise proposals on religious issues and

pluralism Pluralism in general denotes a diversity of views or stands, rather than a single approach or method. Pluralism or pluralist may refer more specifically to: Politics and law * Pluralism (political philosophy), the acknowledgement of a diversi ...

. He was actively involved in setting up a solution to the conversion bill crisis via the Ne'eman Commission, working to avoid a conflict between

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

and the

Jewish Diaspora The Jewish diaspora ( ), alternatively the dispersion ( ) or the exile ( ; ), consists of Jews who reside outside of the Land of Israel. Historically, it refers to the expansive scattering of the Israelites out of their homeland in the Southe ...

. Lubotzky also co-drafted a comprehensive proposal for a new covenant for religion-state affairs in Israel with MK Yossi Beilin.

Awards and recognition

In 2014, he was elected to the

Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, based in Jerusalem, was established in 1961 by the State of Israel to foster contact between Israeli scholars in the sciences and humanities and create a think tank for advising the government on res ...

. In 2015 Lubotzky received the

(ERC) advanced grant for exceptional established research leaders, becoming one of the only researchers receiving the grant twice. In honor of Lubotzky's sixtieth birthday The

Israel Institute for Advanced Studies The Israel Institute for Advanced Studies (; IIAS, or IAS in Israel) is a research institute in Jerusalem, devoted to academic research in physics, mathematics, the life sciences, economics, and comparative religion. It is a self-governing body, ...

hosted a conference (Midrasha) from 5 November through 11 November 2016, with scholars from around the world convening to celebrate his work, impact, and collaborations. In 2018 Lubotzky received the

, for mathematics. Lubotzky gave a Plenary lecture in the 2018

International Congress of Mathematicians The International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) is the largest conference for the topic of mathematics. It meets once every four years, hosted by the International Mathematical Union (IMU). The Fields Medals, the IMU Abacus Medal (known before ...

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...

, Brazil. In 2021 Lubotzky received the European Research Council (ERC) advanced grant for exceptional established research leaders, becoming the only researcher receiving the advanced grant three times. In 2014, he was elected to the

. In 2015 Lubotzky received the

(ERC) advanced grant for exceptional established research leaders, becoming one of the only researchers receiving the grant twice. In 2018 Lubotzky received the

, for mathematics. Lubotzky gave a Plenary lecture in the 2018

for the best Israeli mathematician/computer scientist under the age of 40 * 1993: Ferran Sunyer i Balaguer Prize for the book ''Discrete groups, Expanding Graphs and Invariant Reassures'' * 2002: The Rothschild Prize * 2002: Ferran Sunyer i Balaguer Prize for the book ''Subgroup growth'' * 2003: ISI list of Highly Cited Researchers * 2005: Elected Foreign Honorary Member of the

* 2006: Honorary doctoral degree from the

* 2014: Elected to the

* 2018:

for mathematics

Published works

* * * * *''מבנים אלגבריים: חבורות, חוגים ושדות'', 2018

References

External links

*
Alexander Lubotzky's webpage

*
Alexander Lubotzky
at the

Mathematical Reviews ''Mathematical Reviews'' is a journal published by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) that contains brief synopses, and in some cases evaluations, of many articles in mathematics, statistics, and theoretical computer science. The AMS also pu ...

author summary {{DEFAULTSORT:Lubotzky, Alexander 1956 births Scientists from Tel Aviv 20th-century Israeli mathematicians 21st-century Israeli mathematicians Bar-Ilan University alumni Jewish scientists Academic staff of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Members of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities Israel Prize in mathematics recipients Israeli Orthodox Jews Living people Third Way (Israel) politicians Centre Party (Israel) politicians Jewish Israeli politicians Israeli settlers Members of the 14th Knesset (1996–1999) Yale University faculty Institute for Advanced Study visiting scholars Erdős Prize recipients Ferran Sunyer i Balaguer Prize recipients