Leslie Fox

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This article is about the British mathematician. For the British recipient of the George Cross, see Leslie Fox (GC).
Leslie Fox
Richard Vynne Southwell
Doctoral studentsIain S. Duff
John Reid
Frederic Ris
Joan E. Walsh

Leslie Fox (30 September 1918 – 1 August 1992) was a British mathematician noted for his contribution to numerical analysis.

Overview

Fox studied mathematics as a scholar of

Second World War jointly with his supervisor Richard Southwell
.

On gaining his doctorate in 1942, Fox joined the Admiralty Computing service. Following

Oxford University Computing Laboratory. In 1963, Fox was appointed as Professor of Numerical Analysis at Oxford and Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford
.

Fox's laboratory at Oxford was one of the founding organisations of the

Numerical Algorithms Group (NAG), and Fox was also a dedicated supporter of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications (IMA). The Leslie Fox Prize for Numerical Analysis
of the IMA is named in his honour.

Mathematical work

A detailed description of Fox's mathematical research can be found in obituaries[1]

special functions, and his calculations were used in published tables. The techniques applied to the computation of special functions had much wider applicability including interpolation, stability of recurrence relations
and asymptotic behaviour.

During the 1950s, the group at the National Physics Laboratory worked on numerical linear algebra, which led to the publication of algorithms by Wilkinson and others. While not directly involved in development of numerical software, he supported others in this endeavour. Fox worked on procedures for solving differential equations in which the accuracy of the solution is estimated using asymptotic estimates. Fox's paper on this in 1947[4] led to the work of Victor Pereyra error-correcting algorithms for boundary-value problems and Stetter's results on defect correction and the resulting order of convergence.

Fox was also interested in the treatment of singularities in partial differential equations, the Stefan problem and other cases of free and moving boundaries. Many of these problems arose from his collaboration with mathematicians in industry through the Oxford Study Groups.

Fox's wider influence

While Fox influenced the development of numerical analysis through his undergraduate teaching and postgraduate supervision (he supervised around 19 doctoral students), industrial collaboration he also made significant contributions to course material for the Open University. He lectured widely on 'meaningless answers', describing some of the pitfalls of numerical computation from the uncritical use of simple methods

Fox played a significant part in the early days of the

Manchester
to provide a reliable and well-tested mathematical subroutine library. The Oxford University Computing Laboratory was one of the founder members of NAG when it started in 1970; Fox supported it strongly and he became a member of its council when the Group was incorporated in 1976 continuing in this capacity until 1984.

Fox was an active member of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications from its beginnings, as a member of the Council and as an editor first of the main IMA Journal and later the specialised Journal of Numerical Analysis, started in 1981. The IMA marked his retirement from Oxford in 1983 by a special IMA symposium on 'The contributions of Leslie Fox to numerical analysis'.

His interests extended to mathematics in schools and he participated the development of the

Lloyd N. Trefethen
, went on to be appointed to the chair in Numerical Analysis at Oxford that was created for Leslie Fox in 1963.

Personal life

Leslie Fox's mother was Annie Vincent and his father was Job Senior Fox who was a coalminer.[citation needed] Leslie Fox won a scholarship to Wheelwright Grammar School in Dewsbury, which produced several notable scientists from the same period as Fox.[citation needed]

Fox was a keen sportsman and played

Oxford City Football Club. At the National Physical Laboratory he was club tennis champion and captain of the cricket team, he also distinguished himself as a sprinter in the civil service championships.[citation needed
]

Fox, who had enjoyed good health up to 1981, suffered from heart problems during his retirement and died from a

ruptured aneurysm in the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, in 1992.[citation needed
]

Selected publications

References

  1. ^ David F. Mayers and Joan E. Walsh, Bulletin London Maths Soc. 31 (1999), 241–247."Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 9 October 2006. Retrieved 19 May 2007.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  2. ^ J. H. Wilkinson, Fox, Leslie Obituary: Comput. J. 30 (1987), no. 1, 1. 01A70
  3. ^ Fox, L. Solution by relaxation methods of plane potential problems with mixed boundary conditions. Quart. Appl. Math. 2, (1944)
  4. ^ Fox, L. Some improvements in the use of relaxation methods for the solution of ordinary and partial differential equations. Proc. Roy. Soc. London. Ser. A. 190, (1947). 31—59

External links


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