Edith Helen Stern (born 1952) is an American inventor and mathematician and former Vice President for Research and Development at IBM. She holds over 100

US patent Under United States law, a patent is a right granted to the inventor of a (1) process, machine, article of manufacture, or composition of matter, (2) that is new, useful, and non-obvious. A patent is the right to exclude others, for a limited ...

s and was awarded the

ASME The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) is an American professional association that, in its own words, "promotes the art, science, and practice of multidisciplinary engineering and allied sciences around the globe" via " continuing ...

Kate Gleason Award. Stern was a

child prodigy A child prodigy is defined in psychology research literature as a person under the age of ten who produces meaningful output in some domain at the level of an adult expert. The term is also applied more broadly to young people who are extraor ...

who was intensively educated by her father, having read the ''

Encyclopædia Britannica The ( Latin for "British Encyclopædia") is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia. It is published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.; the company has existed since the 18th century, although it has changed ownership various ...

'' at the age of 5 and was the youngest ever graduate of

Florida Atlantic University Florida Atlantic University (Florida Atlantic or FAU) is a public research university with its main campus in Boca Raton, Florida, and satellite campuses in Dania Beach, Davie, Fort Lauderdale, Jupiter, and Fort Pierce. FAU belongs to the 1 ...

at the age of 15.

Early life and education

Stern's father, the scholar Aaron Stern, had been in concentration camps during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. He married Stern's mother, Bella, in a ghetto in Warsaw. Aaron Stern suffered from cancer and was treated at the Mayo Clinic because of a request from

Albert Einstein Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theor ...

. His experiences in the concentration camps led to his conviction that the world's evil was the result of stupidity and if people were smarter "they would be less likely to follow another Hitler". Upon the birth of Edith, Aaron Stern announced to reporters his ambitions to make her into a genius "and a perfect person". Disabled by his time in the concentration camps and unable to work, Aaron devoted his time to intensively rearing his daughter, constantly speaking to her even as an infant. He encouraged his daughter to become an academic, in a technique he referred to as ''total education immersion''. She used

flashcard A flashcard or flash card (also known as an index card) is a card bearing information on both sides, which is intended to be used as an aid in memorization. Each flashcard bears a question on one side and an answer on the other. Flashcards are ...

s to communicate messages before she could talk, including expressing her age at 11 months old, had mastered the alphabet by the age of two, and played

chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...

by the age of three. Aaron bought a set of the ''Encyclopaedia Britannica''; Edith read them by the time she was four. (Adults who have claimed to have read most of Britannica include

George Bernard Shaw George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from ...

who ignored the science articles). She was taken to museums and operas. She used a homemade

abacus The abacus (''plural'' abaci or abacuses), also called a counting frame, is a calculating tool which has been used since ancient times. It was used in the ancient Near East, Europe, China, and Russia, centuries before the adoption of the H ...

to learn mathematics, and was simultaneously taught ethics and compassion for people from different backgrounds. Despite her father not supporting

IQ test An intelligence quotient (IQ) is a total score derived from a set of standardized tests or subtests designed to assess human intelligence. The abbreviation "IQ" was coined by the psychologist William Stern for the German term ''Intelligen ...

s, Stern's IQ was said to be 205 at the age of 5. By the age of 6 Stern had read

Plato Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institutio ...

Freud Sigmund Freud ( , ; born Sigismund Schlomo Freud; 6 May 1856 – 23 September 1939) was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies explained as originating in conflicts ...

and

Darwin Darwin may refer to: Common meanings * Charles Darwin (1809–1882), English naturalist and writer, best known as the originator of the theory of biological evolution by natural selection * Darwin, Northern Territory, a territorial capital city i ...

. Stern enrolled in college at the age of twelve, and earned a degree from

Miami-Dade Junior College Miami Dade College (Miami Dade, MDC or Dade) is a public college in Miami, Florida. Founded in 1959, it has a total of eight campuses and twenty-one outreach centers throughout Miami-Dade County. It is the largest college in the Florida College ...

by the age of 15. She earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics at

in 1967, and was their youngest ever graduate. She was part of the

Chess Team. Stern went on to obtain a master's degree in mathematics at

Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State, MSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, the fi ...

. Her father, who dubbed raising his daughter ''the Edith project,'' wrote a book about her upbringing, ''The Making of a Genius'', which was published by Hurricane House Publishers in 1971. He gave a series of lectures at Stanford University about his ideas on education. The pressure of being in the public eye from an early age disrupted her family life.

Career

Stern taught mathematics at

before she turned twenty. She joined IBM as an intern in the early 1970s and was eventually promoted to Vice President for

research and development Research and development (R&D or R+D), known in Europe as research and technological development (RTD), is the set of innovative activities undertaken by corporations or governments in developing new services or products, and improving existi ...

. She worked on real-time computing for IBM, and is credited for creating direct dialing and

last-call return Last-call return, automatic recall, or (on PBX and centrex service) camp-on, is a telecommunication feature offered by telephony service providers to subscribers to provide the subscriber with the telephone number, and sometimes the time, of th ...

. Stern worked on

health informatics Health informatics is the field of science and engineering that aims at developing methods and technologies for the acquisition, processing, and study of patient data, which can come from different sources and modalities, such as electronic ...

for

IBM Watson IBM Watson is a question-answering computer system capable of answering questions posed in natural language, developed in IBM's DeepQA project by a research team led by principal investigator David Ferrucci. Watson was named after IBM's founder ...

. She was also involved with a team that won a

Technology & Engineering Emmy Award The Technology and Engineering Emmy Awards, or Technology and Engineering Emmys, are one of two sets of Emmy Awards that are presented for outstanding achievement in engineering development in the television industry. The Technology and Enginee ...

for their work on digital commercials for the

Warner Bros. Television Warner Bros. Television Studios (operating under the name Warner Bros. Television; formerly known as Warner Bros. Television Division) is an American television production and distribution studio of the Warner Bros. Television Group division of ...

network.

Awards and honors

Stern has over 120

s. Stern was the first woman to be made a full member of the

American Society Of Mechanical Engineers The American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) is an American professional association that, in its own words, "promotes the art, science, and practice of multidisciplinary engineering and allied sciences around the globe" via "continuing ...

(ASME). In 1998, Stern was named an IBM ''master inventor'', and was elected to the IBM Academy of Technology in 1999. In 2012, Stern was awarded the AMSE

Kate Gleason Catherine Anselm Gleason (November 24/25, 1865 – January 9, 1933) was an American engineer and businesswoman known for her accomplishments in the field of engineering and for her philanthropy. Starting at a young age, she managed several impor ...

Award for her lifetime of developing new technologies. She was awarded the

Talon Award in 2013. In 2015, Stern was listed by ''

Business Insider ''Insider'', previously named ''Business Insider'' (''BI''), is an American financial and business news website founded in 2007. Since 2015, a majority stake in ''Business Insider''s parent company Insider Inc. has been owned by the German pub ...

'' as one of the Smartest People of All Time.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Stern, Edith American women mathematicians Jewish women scientists Florida Atlantic University alumni IBM Research computer scientists Michigan State University alumni 1952 births Living people 20th-century American women inventors 20th-century American inventors 21st-century American Jews 21st-century American women American people of Polish-Jewish descent Miami Dade College alumni Mathematicians from Florida Inventors from Florida Scientists from Miami