We
are
saddened
to
announce
that
our
colleague
and
friend
Tom
Coleman,
Professor
of
Combinatorics
and
Optimization
at
University
of
Waterloo,
passed
away
on
April
20
after
a
battle
with
cancer.
Tom
was
a
pioneer
in
many
aspects
of
optimization
and
scientific
computing
including
combinatorial
scientific
computing,
parallel
optimization,
automatic
differentiation,
and
portfolio
optimization.
In
addition
to
his
influential
scientific
work
including
eight
books,
he
was
an
advisor
and
mentor
to
dozens
of
masters,
PhD
and
postdoctoral
students.
He
also
served
in
multiple
leadership
roles
in
our
community,
including
as
Director
of
the
Cornell
Theory
Center
and
as
Dean
of
Mathematics
at
Waterloo,
and
was
awarded
several
honors
including
SIAM
Fellow
and
the
Ophelia
Lazaridis
University
Research
Chair
at
Waterloo.
He
will
be
greatly
missed.
A
longer
biography
will
appear
soon
on
the
University
of
Waterloo
C&O
department
website.
A
private
family
memorial
service
will
be
held
on
Monday,
April
26
10
AM
EDT;
the
service
will
be
livestreamed
and
friends
are
invited
to
participate.
An
obituary
and
information
on
joining
the
livestreamed
memorial
service
are
available
here.
An
obituary,
written
by
Alex
Pothen,
Steve
Vavasis
and
Henry
Wolkowicz,
can
be
found
here.
