Carlton Edward Lemke (October 11, 1920April 12, 2004) was an American mathematician.
After fighting in WWII with the
82nd Airborne Division
The 82nd Airborne Division is an Airborne forces, airborne infantry division (military), division of the United States Army specializing in Paratrooper, parachute assault operations into hostile areasSof, Eric"82nd Airborne Division" ''Spec Ops ...
, then under a GI grant, he received his bachelor's degree in 1949 at the
University of Buffalo
The State University of New York at Buffalo (commonly referred to as UB, University at Buffalo, and sometimes SUNY Buffalo) is a public university, public research university in Buffalo, New York, Buffalo and Amherst, New York, United States. ...
and his PhD (Extremal Problems in Linear Inequalities) in 1953 at
Carnegie Mellon University
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. The institution was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools. In 1912, it became the Carnegie Institu ...
(then Carnegie Institute of Technology). In 1952–1954 he was instructor at the Carnegie Institute of Technology and in 1954–55 at the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory of General Electric. In 1955–56 he was an engineer at the Radio Corporation of America in New Jersey. From 1956 he was assistant professor and later professor at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Since 1967, he was there Ford Foundation Professor of Mathematics.
His research is in Algebra, Mathematical Programming, Operations Research, and Statistics. In 1954 Lemke developed the dual simplex method, independently from
E. M. L. Beale.
In 1962 he developed for the convex quadratic linear programming case a new simplex method using an original ''complementary pivotal scheme'' which yields at each simplex tableau a current solution with one artificial variable
('Lemke start') and
, which is primal
feasible and dual
feasible but the artificial variable
which becomes
at the optimum. This is the core method for his subsequent constructive proof(1964) that the number of Nash( bimatrix) equilibrium points is odd.
He is then also known for his contribution to game theory. In 1964 Lemke (with J. T. Howson) constructed an algorithm for finding Nash equilibria the case of finite two-person games. For this work Lemke received in 1978 the John von Neumann Theory Prize.
He was elected to the 2002 class of
Fellow
A fellow is a title and form of address for distinguished, learned, or skilled individuals in academia, medicine, research, and industry. The exact meaning of the term differs in each field. In learned society, learned or professional society, p ...
s of the
Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences
The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is an international society for practitioners in the fields of operations research
Operations research () (U.S. Air Force Specialty Code: Operations Analysis), often s ...
.
Selected bibliography
* Lemke, Carlton E. The dual method of solving the linear programming problem, ''Naval Research Logistics Quarterly'', Vol. 1, 1954, pp. 36–47
* Lemke C. E. A Method of Solution for Quadratic Programs, ''Management Science'', 8(4),1962, pp. 442-453
* Lemke, Carlton E. and J. T. Howson. Equilibrium points of bimatrix games, ''Journal of the SIAM'', Volume 12, 1964, pp. 413–423
References
External links
*
Biography of Carlton Lemkefrom the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lemke, Carlton E.
20th-century American mathematicians
1920 births
American game theorists
John von Neumann Theory Prize winners
Fellows of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences
2004 deaths
University at Buffalo alumni
Carnegie Mellon University alumni