Elizabeth Hahnemann Cuthill (October 16, 1923 – January 11, 2011) was an American

applied mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History One ...

and

numerical analyst Numerical may refer to: * Number * Numerical digit * Numerical analysis Numerical analysis is the study of algorithms that use numerical approximation (as opposed to symbolic computation, symbolic manipulations) for the problems of mathematical ...

known for her work on

sparse matrix In numerical analysis and scientific computing, a sparse matrix or sparse array is a matrix in which most of the elements are zero. There is no strict definition regarding the proportion of zero-value elements for a matrix to qualify as sparse ...

algorithms, on block iterative methods for the numerical approximation of differential equations, and on the development of computer simulations of

nuclear reactor A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a Nuclear fission, fission nuclear chain reaction. They are used for Nuclear power, commercial electricity, nuclear marine propulsion, marine propulsion, Weapons-grade plutonium, weapons ...

s. She was a researcher for the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the naval warfare, maritime military branch, service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is the world's most powerful navy with the largest Displacement (ship), displacement, at 4.5 millio ...

at the

David Taylor Model Basin The David W. Taylor Model Basin (DTMB) is one of the largest ship model basins—test facilities for the development of ship design—in the world. DTMB is a field activity of the Carderock Division of the Naval Surface Warfare Center. History ...

. The

Cuthill–McKee algorithm In numerical linear algebra, the Cuthill–McKee algorithm (CM), named after Elizabeth Cuthill and James McKee,E. Cuthill and J. McKeethe bandwidth of sparse symmetric matrices''In Proc. 24th Nat. Conf. Association for Computing Machinery, ACM, ...

and reverse Cuthill–McKee algorithm are heuristics for permuting matrices into forms with small

bandwidth Bandwidth commonly refers to: * Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range * Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...

and for associated problems in

graph bandwidth In graph theory, the graph bandwidth problem is to label the vertices of a graph with distinct integers so that the quantity \max\ is minimized ( is the edge set of ). The problem may be visualized as placing the vertices of a graph at distin ...

, named for the work of Cuthill with James McKee.

Education and career

Cuthill was born on October 16, 1923, in Connecticut, the daughter of Paul Richard Hahnemann and Barbara Baumann Hahnemann. She earned a master's degree in applied mathematics at

Brown University Brown University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Providence, Rhode Island, United States. It is the List of colonial colleges, seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the US, founded in 1764 as the ' ...

in 1946, with a master's thesis "On the velocity distribution and stability of flow through a two-dimensional channel" supervised by

Chia-Chiao Lin Chia-Chiao Lin (; 7 July 1916 – 13 January 2013) was a Chinese-born American applied mathematician and Institute Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Lin made major contributions to the theory of hydrodynamic stabilit ...

. After this, she completed a Ph.D. at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota Twin Cities (historically known as University of Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint ...

in 1951; her dissertation, ''Integrals on Spaces of Functions which are Real and Continuous on Finite and Infinite Intervals'', was supervised by

Robert Horton Cameron Robert Horton Cameron (May 17, 1908 – July 17, 1989) was an American mathematician, who worked on analysis and probability theory. He is known for the Cameron–Martin theorem. Education and career Cameron received his Ph.D. in 1932 from Corne ...

. While completing her doctorate, she became an instructor at

Purdue University Purdue University is a Public university#United States, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, United States, and the flagship campus of the Purdue University system. The university was founded ...

. In 1953, she became a researcher for the

, working at the

, where she became Numerical Analysis Coordinator for the Computation, Mathematics, and Logistics Department. She died on January 11, 2011, in

Frederick, Maryland Frederick is a city in, and the county seat of, Frederick County, Maryland, United States. Frederick's population was 78,171 people as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of municipalities in Maryland, second-largest ...

Recognition

Cuthill was named a Fellow of the

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is a United States–based international nonprofit with the stated mission of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsib ...

in 1963. In 1976, she won the David W. Taylor Award of the US Navy "for her valuable contributions in the development and exploitation of mathematical and computational techniques for significant Navy applications".

Selected publications

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cuthill, Elizabeth 1923 births 2011 deaths 20th-century American mathematicians American applied mathematicians Brown University alumni University of Minnesota alumni Female United States Navy civilians Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science 21st-century American women 20th-century American women mathematicians