George Leitmann
George Leitmann (born May 24, 1925) is an Austrian-born American engineering scientist and educator.
Early life and education
Leitmann was born on May 24, 1925, to a fully assimilated Jewish family in
Nonetheless, by the spring of 1940 the situation in Austria had become so dangerous that George's father fled to neighboring Yugoslavia, still an independent kingdom, and the rest of the family, George, his mother and two grandmothers, were able to emigrate to the US in April 1940. Tragically, Yugoslavia was occupied by Germany a year later and George's father was murdered in a concentration camp in Nis, Serbia.[3]
George attended a Technical High School in New York from which he graduated in December 1943, whereupon he immediately volunteered for the Army and was inducted in February 1944 into a Combat Engineer Battalion, which began its combat duties in France and Germany in late 1944. During
After the end of the war in Europe, George was transferred to the Army Counter Intelligence Corps as its youngest Special Agent and, among other assignments, served as an interrogator at the
Academic career
After the discharge from the army in May 1946, George studied physics at Columbia University and received the BA and MS degrees in 1949 and 1950, respectively. From 1950 to 1957 he was employed at the US Naval Ordnance Station (USNOTS), China Lake, California, first as a physicist and then head of the aeroballistics analysis section. This assignment involved both theoretical as well as experimental research in the exterior ballistics of rockets. While working at USNOTS, he also enrolled in the PhD program of the University of California, Berkeley, from which he received the PhD in engineering science in 1956. He joined the engineering faculty at UC Berkeley in 1957 as an assistant professor, and was advanced to associate professor in 1959 and professor in 1963. He was emerited in 1991 and continued both research and university service until 2018.[4]
Research contributions and academic services
George contributed greatly to the theory of
Professional services
George has held membership in many professional and government committees. He was the Founding President of the American Alexander von Humboldt Association (1994–1997). He was Co-Editor of the Journal of Mathematical Analysis and Applications for 16 years and serves/ed as associate editor of four journals and editorial board member of eight journals.[4]
Honors and awards
The following constitutes a partial list. He is a member of the US
References
- ^ "George Leitmann 'Engineering Science, Risk and Relationships at UC Berkeley and Beyond' transcript of interviews conducted by Paul Burnett in 2018 and 2019, Oral History Center of the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley" (PDF).
- ^ "Eleven of George Leitmann's oral history interview videos". YouTube.
- ^ "National Museum ~ Niš: Jewish Prisoners of the Concentration Camp "Red Cross", Author: Zoran Milentijević, 1978; translated by Dušan M. Stipanović" (PDF).
- ^ a b c "Curriculum Vitae (CV)" (PDF).
- ^ a b "Publications" (PDF).
- ^ "'PERSONAGE IN SCIENCE, Professor G. Leitmann', A.A. Martynyuk, S. Pickl and H. I. Freedman, Nonlinear Dynamics and Systems Theory, 10 (3), pp. 203-210, 2010" (PDF).
- ^ "Elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1982".
- ^ "Received the Austrian Cross of Honor for Science and Art in 2013". Facebook.
- ^ "The 1981 Louis E. Levy Medal from the Franklin Institute". 13 January 2014.
- ^ "The 1995 Rufus Oldenburger Medal from the American Society of Mechanical Engineers".
- ^ "The 2004 Isaacs' Award of the International Society of Dynamic Games".
- ^ "The 2009 Richard E. Bellman Control Heritage Award from the American Automatic Control Council, for 'Pioneering contributions to geometric optimal control, quantitative and qualitative differential games, and stabilization and control of deterministic uncertain systems, and for exemplary service to the control field'".
- ^ "In 2013 the French government named Leitmann a Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur". YouTube.