Name | Sir John Frank Charles Kingman |
---|---|
Birth date | August 28, 1939 |
Birth place | Beckenham, Kent |
Work institutions | University of CambridgeUniversity of SussexUniversity of OxfordScience and Engineering Research CouncilUniversity of Western AustraliaAustralian National UniversityUniversity of BristolIsaac Newton Institute |
Alma mater | Pembroke College, Cambridge (B.A. 1960)University of Oxford |
Doctoral advisor | Peter Whittle and David Kendall (Ph.D. not completed) |
Doctoral students | John D. BigginsWilfrid S. KendallPeter Martin LeePeter Gavin Hall |
Known for | Coalescent theoryKingman's formula |
Prizes | Guy Medal in Silver (1981)Royal Medal (1983)Knight Bachelor (1985) |
He was N. M. Rothschild and Sons Professor of Mathematical Sciences and Director of the Isaac Newton Institute at the University of Cambridge from 2001 until 2006, when he was succeeded by Sir David Wallace. He is famous for developing the mathematics of the coalescent, a theoretical model of inheritance, which is fundamental to modern population genetics.
The grandson of a coal miner, he grew up in London, eventually being awarded a scholarship to read mathematics at Pembroke College, Cambridge in 1956. On graduating in 1960, he began work on his PhD under the supervision of Peter Whittle, studying queueing theory, Markov chains and regenerative phenomena. A year later, Whittle left Cambridge for the University of Manchester, and, rather than follow him there, Kingman moved instead to Oxford where he resumed his work under David Kendall. After another year, Kendall was appointed to a professorship at Cambridge and so Kingman returned to the University. He returned, however, as a member of the teaching staff (and a Fellow of Pembroke College) and never completed his PhD.
He married Valerie Cromwell, with whom he has two children, in 1964. In 1965, he took up the post of Reader at the University of Sussex where she was teaching, and was elected Professor of Mathematics and Statistics the next year. He held this post until 1969, when he moved to Oxford as Professor of Mathematics, a position he held until 1985. He has said of this appointment:
Statistics in Oxford in 1969 was frankly a mess. There was no professor of statistics, the only chair having been abolished some years before...[Maurice Bartlett and] I conspired to persuade Oxford to take statistics seriously.
The London Mathematical Society awarded Kingman its Berwick Prize in 1967 In 1971, Kingman was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, later receiving its Royal Medal in 1983 "[i]n recognition of his distinguished researches on queuing theory, on regenerative phenomena, and on mathematical genetics". He was also awarded the Guy Medal in silver by the Royal Statistical Society in 1981. During his time at Oxford, as well as holding a Fellowship at St. Anne's College from 1978 to 1985, Kingman also chaired the Science and Engineering Research Council (now the EPSRC) from 1981 to 1985, was vice-president of the Institute of Statisticians from 1978 until 1992 and held visiting appointments at the University of Western Australia (1974) and the Australian National University (1978).
In 1985, Kingman was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for his work with the Science and Engineering Research Council. From October that year, Sir John was elected Vice-Chancellor of the University of Bristol. He remained in Bristol until 2001 when he took up his post at the Isaac Newton Institute in Cambridge. Shortly after making that move, Kingman drew some media attention for having the third-highest salary among British Vice-Chancellors and this having nearly doubled in his final year in the job, at a time when most academics received pay-rises of about 3%. Whilst at Bristol, he also served in a number of other capacities. In the academic field, he was president of the Royal Statistical Society from 1987 to 1989, and president of the London Mathematical Society from 1990 to 1992. In public service, he was a member of the board of the British Council between 1986 and 1991 and was on the Board of the British Technology Group from 1986 until after it was privatised in 1992. He also held directorships at a number of industrial companies, including IBM from 1985 to 1995 and SmithKline Beecham from 1986 to 1989. In 1987/88, Kingman chaired the Committee of Inquiry into the teaching of the English language. In 2000, the Chancellor of the Exchequer appointed Sir John the first chairman of the Statistics Commission, the body that oversees the work of the Office for National Statistics, the UK government's statistics agency. In 2002, Kingman attracted some media attention by telling the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee that the 2011 UK Census could be conducted using new technology rather than the traditional headcount, or even not conducted at all.
Sir John holds honorary degrees from the universities of Sussex, Southampton, Bristol, the West of England, and Queen's, Ontario.
__NOTOC__
Category:1939 births Category:Living people Category:Alumni of Pembroke College, Cambridge Category:English mathematicians Category:English academics Category:Fellows of the Royal Society Category:Knights Bachelor Category:English statisticians Category:Presidents of the Royal Statistical Society Category:Academics of the University of Bristol Category:People from Beckenham Category:Probability theorists Category:Vice Chancellors of the University of Bristol Category:Winners of the Guy Medal in Silver Category:Royal Medal winners Category:Population geneticists Category:Queueing theorists Category:Members of Academia Europaea
de:John Kingman es:John Kingman ht:John Kingman pt:John KingmanThis text is licensed under the Creative Commons CC-BY-SA License. This text was originally published on Wikipedia and was developed by the Wikipedia community.
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