December 18, 2004
Purdue trustees name distinguished prof, OK degree programs
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WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – The Purdue University Board of Trustees today (Saturday, Dec. 18) approved the appointment of a distinguished professor and the creation of new degree programs.
Laszlo Lempert, who has been a Purdue faculty member since 1988, was appointed as a distinguished professor of mathematics. With this appointment, Purdue has 101 named or distinguished professors.
"Professor Lempert's achievements are recognized in the mathematical community around the world," said Provost Sally Mason. "He is an insightful mathematician, an excellent lecturer and an influential research adviser, epitomizing everything that is the hallmark of a distinguished professor."
Lempert, a professor of mathematics, is an expert in complex geometry and complex analysis in infinite dimensional spaces. His research interests include complex analysis, partial differential equations and differential geometry.
He is a member of the Hungarian Mathematical Society, American Mathematical Society and an external member of the Hungarian Academy of Science. Among his honors are the Grunwald Prize from the Hungarian Mathematical Society, the Alexits Prize from the Hungarian Academy of Science and the American Mathematical Society's Bergman Prize. Lempert has more than 50 publications, the more recent ones uncovering fundamental properties of functions that have infinitely many independent variables. These results are expected to be of relevance even outside mathematics, to physical theories that deal with systems with infinitely many degrees of freedom, such as field theories, Lempert said.
He received his undergraduate and doctorate degrees from the University of Budapest in 1975 and 1979, respectively, and was a candidate of sciences at the Hungarian Academy of Science in 1984.
Before coming to Purdue, Lempert was a visiting lecturer at Princeton University from 1984 to 1985, taught at the University of Budapest from 1975 to 1992 and was a visiting research fellow at the University of Paris from 1979 to 1980.
Trustees also approved offering three new degrees from the Department of Engineering Education – a master of science degree, a master of science in engineering education degree and a doctoral degree.
"Our engineering education department is the first of its kind in the United States," Mason said. "Engineering education is emerging as a discipline for guiding engineering practice, preparing faculty and curriculum development."
Mason said up to 10 students could enroll in the programs by this fall. Within the next five years, up to 42 students could be working on advanced degrees in engineering education.
Also approved were the creation of a master of science degree program in organizational leadership and supervision at the Fort Wayne campus and a master of business administration degree program at the North Central campus.
In other business, the trustees also approved renaming the School of Pharmacy and Pharmacal Sciences the School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences.
Writer: J. Michael Willis, (765) 494-0371, jmwillis@purdue.edu
Source: Sally Mason, (765) 494-9709, sfmason@purdue.edu
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