CHEMISTRY

Thomas F. Coleman, director of the Cornell Theory Center (CTC) and professor of computer science and applied mathematics, will become the Dean of the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Waterloo, effective July 1, 2005. "Of course this was a very hard decision as it is not easy to leave such a great place and beautiful area, but the offer was too good to turn down," said Coleman. "My home department will be Combinatorics and Optimization. I will be leading a college of mathematical sciences, comprised of five departments-computer science, applied mathematics, statistics, combinatorics and optimization, and pure mathematics-and about 200 faculty members. It is a leading institute for research and teaching in the mathematical sciences, and climbing!" "Cornell is sad to lose such a dynamic leader and distinguished scientist as Tom Coleman," said Dean of Computing and Information Sciences (CIS) Robert Constable. CTC joined the CIS team in July 2004. "Those of you who worked with Tom from the time he became director know what a marvelous job he did in building the Center into a powerhouse in high-performance computing and in broadening its mission." Other accomplishments during his tenure include the following: * In 2002, CTC's leadership team successfully launched the High-Performance Solutions alliance, an agreement that secured $60 million worth of resources from Intel, Dell, and Microsoft to provide a suite of Windows-based, high- performance computing solutions and services to business, government, and academic clients. * In 1998, Coleman established and has since served as the director of the Computational Finance program, created to design customized solutions for complex mathematical and computational problems arising in the financial services industry. The group focuses its efforts on the optimization and efficient numerical implementation for both research and commercial applications. * He developed CTC-Manhattan, a satellite site in Manhattan devoted to computational finance that serves the needs of executives in the financial services industry. * Coleman has been instrumental in attracting highly qualified and committed faculty associate directors to help guide the Center's direction: Currently, professor of engineering Tony Ingraffea, professor of computer science Johannes Gehrke, and professor of biological sciences David Shalloway serve as associate directors for the Center. * Coleman significantly expanded the Center's funding base, developing valuable partnerships with national and international organizations. Coleman is currently on the editorial board of numerous professional journals. He is the author of two books on computational mathematics, the editor of four proceedings, and has published more than 60 journal articles in the areas of optimization, automatic differentiation, parallel computing, and computational finance. Coleman is a research consultant for a number of finance-related companies and efforts based in New York, Boston, Seoul, Singapore, and Tokyo. As a researcher, Coleman explores the design and understanding of practical and efficient numerical algorithms for continuous optimization problems. His primary interest is the development of computational methods and tools for large-scale problems with emphasis on applications of computational finance. Specific interests include the computation of implied volatility surfaces from option prices, hedging techniques, index tracking, portfolio optimization, and the use of parallel computing techniques in computational finance. Coleman received his Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Waterloo in 1979 and worked for two years as a postdoctoral associate in the Applied Mathematics Division of Argonne National Laboratory (Chicago). He has been a faculty member in the Computer Science Department at Cornell University since 1981. "CTC is a highly valued unit in the Cornell community, providing important services for researchers whose work depends on high-performance computing," said Constable. "I am pleased to note that there is tremendous support and respect for the CTC across campus. CTC will be celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2005. We've seen tremendous work from this group during the last two decades and expect to see continued pioneering developments well into the future."