- Wikipedia

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Claude Shannon
Shannon c. 1950s
Born	Claude Elwood Shannon (1916-04-30)April 30, 1916 Petoskey, Michigan, U.S.
Died	February 24, 2001(2001-02-24) (aged 84) Medford, Massachusetts, U.S.
Education	University of Michigan (BS, BSE) \nMassachusetts Institute of Technology (MS, PhD)
Known for	\n \n \nInformation theory \n\"A Mathematical Theory of Communication\" \nA Symbolic Analysis of Relay and Switching Circuits \n\"Communication Theory of Secrecy Systems\" \nArtificial intelligence \nBeta distribution \nBinary code \nBlock cipher \nBoolean algebra \nChannel capacity \nComputer chess \nData compression \nDigital electronics \nDigital Revolution \nDigital subscriber line \nEdge coloring \nEntropy in information theory \nEntropy (information theory) \nEntropy power inequality \nError-correcting codes with feedback \nEvaluation function \nFinancial signal processing \nInformation processing \nInformation-theoretic security \nInnovation (signal processing) \nKey size \nLogic gate \nLogic synthesis \nMinivac 601 \nModels of communication \nn-gram \nNoisy channel coding theorem \nNyquist\u2013Shannon sampling theorem \nOne-time pad \nProduct cipher \nPulse-code modulation \nRate\u2013distortion theory \nSampling \nShannon\u2013Fano coding \nShannon\u2013Hartley law \nShannon capacity \nShannon entropy \nShannon's expansion \nShannon index \nShannon's Maxim \nShannon multigraph \nShannon number \nShannon security \nShannon's source coding theorem \nShannon switching game \nShannon-Weaver model of communication \nStream cipher \nSwitching circuit theory \nSymbolic dynamics \nUncertainty coefficient \nUnits of information \nUseless machine \nWearable computer \nWhittaker\u2013Shannon interpolation formula \n
Spouse(s)	Norma Levor (1940\u201341) \nBetty Shannon (1949\u20132001 (his death))
Awards	Alfred Noble Prize (1939)\n Morris Liebmann Memorial Prize (1949) \n Stuart Ballantine Medal (1955) \n IEEE Medal of Honor (1966) \n National Medal of Science (1966) \n Harvey Prize (1972) \n Claude E. Shannon Award (1973) \n Harold Pender Award (1978) \n John Fritz Medal (1983) \n Kyoto Prize (1985) \n Audio Engineering Society Gold Medal Award (1985) \n Marconi Society Lifetime Achievement Award (2000) \n National Inventors Hall of Fame (2004) \n
Scientific career
Fields	Mathematics, computer science, electronic engineering, artificial intelligence
Institutions	\n Bell Labs \n MIT \n Institute for Advanced Study \n
Theses	\n A Symbolic Analysis of Relay and Switching Circuits (1937) \n An Algebra for Theoretical Genetics (1940) \n
Doctoral advisor	Frank Lauren Hitchcock
Doctoral students	\n Elwyn Berlekamp \n Danny Hillis \n Leonard Kleinrock \n Ivan Sutherland \n Bert Sutherland \n
\n

Claude Elwood Shannon (April 30, 1916 \u2013 February 24, 2001) was an American mathematician, electrical engineer, computer scientist, cryptographer and inventor known as the \"father of information theory\" and as the \"father of the Information Age\".^[1] Shannon was the first to describe the Boolean gates (electronic circuits) that are essential to all digital electronic circuits, and was one of the founding fathers of artificial intelligence.^[2]^[3]^[4]^[1] Shannon is credited with laying the foundations of the Information Age.^[5]^[6]^[7]\n

At the University of Michigan, Shannon dual degreed, graduating with a Bachelor of Science in both electrical engineering and mathematics in 1936. A 21-year-old master's degree student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in electrical engineering, his thesis concerned switching circuit theory, demonstrating that electrical applications of Boolean algebra could construct any logical numerical relationship,^[8] thereby establishing the theory behind digital computing and digital circuits.^[9] The thesis has been claimed to be the most important master's thesis of all time,^[8] having also been called the \"birth certificate of the digital revolution\",^[10] and winning the 1939 Alfred Noble Prize.^[11] He then graduated with a PhD in mathematics from MIT in 1940,^[12] with his thesis focused on genetics, with it deriving important results, but it went unpublished.^[13]\n

Shannon contributed to the field of cryptanalysis for national defense of the United States during World War II, including his fundamental work on codebreaking and secure telecommunications, writing a paper which is considered one of the foundational pieces of modern cryptography,^[14] with his work described as \"a turning point, and marked the closure of classical cryptography and the beginning of modern cryptography.\"^[15] The work of Shannon is the foundation of secret-key cryptography, including the work of Horst Feistel, the Data Encryption Standard (DES), Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), and more.^[15] As a result, Shannon has been called the \"founding father of modern cryptography\".^[16]\n

His \"A Mathematical Theory of Communication\" paper in 1948 laid the foundations for the field of information theory,^[17]^[12] with his famous paper referred to as a \"blueprint for the digital era\" by electrical engineer Robert G. Gallager.^[18] It has been called \"the Magna Carta of the Information Age\" by Scientific American,^[6]^[19] along with his work being described as being at \"the heart of today's digital information technology\".^[20] The mathematician Solomon W. Golomb remarked on Shannon's influence on the digital age that \"It's like saying how much influence the inventor of the alphabet has had on literature.\"^[17] Shannon's theory is widely used and has been fundamental to the success of many scientific endeavors, such as the invention of the compact disc, the development of the Internet, feasibility of mobile phones, the understanding of black holes, and more, and is at the intersection of numerous important fields.^[21]^[22] Shannon also formally introduced the term \"bit\".^[23]^[7]\n

Shannon made numerous contributions to the field of artificial intelligence,^[2] writing papers on programming a computer for chess, which have been immensely influential.^[24]^[25] His Theseus machine was the first electrical device to learn by trial and error, being one of the first examples of artificial intelligence.^[26]^[27] He also co-organized and participated in the Dartmouth workshop of 1956, considered the founding event of the field of artificial intelligence.^[28]^[29] \n

Roboticist Rodney Brooks declared that Shannon was the 20th century engineer who contributed the most to 21st century technologies,^[26] and Golomb described the intellectual achievement of Shannon as \"one of the greatest of the twentieth century\".^[30] His achievements are considered to be on par with those of Albert Einstein, Sir Isaac Newton, and Charles Darwin.^[5]^[17]^[4]^[31]\n

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v t e Timelines of computing
Computing	\n Before 1950 \n 1950\u20131979 \n 1980s \n 1990s \n 2000s \n 2010s \n 2020s \n Scientific \n Women in computing \n
Computer science	\n Algorithms \n Artificial intelligence \n Binary prefixes \n Cryptography \n Machine learning \n Quantum computing and communication \n
Software	\n Free and open-source software \n Hypertext technology \n Operating systems\n DOS family \n Windows \n Linux \n Programming languages \n Virtualization development \n Malware \n
Internet	\n Internet conflicts \n Web browsers \n Web search engines \n
Notable people	\n Kathleen Antonelli \n John Vincent Atanasoff \n Charles Babbage \n John Backus \n Jean Bartik \n George Boole \n Vint Cerf \n John Cocke \n Stephen Cook \n Edsger W. Dijkstra \n J. Presper Eckert \n Adele Goldstine \n Lois Haibt \n Betty Holberton \n Margaret Hamilton \n Grace Hopper \n David A. Huffman \n Bob Kahn \n Brian Kernighan \n Andrew Koenig \n Semyon Korsakov \n Nancy Leveson \n Ada Lovelace \n Donald Knuth \n Joseph Kruskal \n Douglas McIlroy \n Marlyn Meltzer \n John von Neumann \n Kl\u00e1ra D\u00e1n von Neumann \n Dennis Ritchie \n Guido van Rossum \n Claude Shannon \n Frances Spence \n Bjarne Stroustrup \n Ruth Teitelbaum \n Ken Thompson \n Linus Torvalds \n Alan Turing \n Paul Vixie \n Larry Wall \n Stephen Wolfram \n Niklaus Wirth \n Steve Wozniak \n Konrad Zuse \n

Authority control databases $\"Edit$
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Biography

Childhood

Logic circuits

Wartime research

Information theory

Artificial Intelligence

Teaching at MIT

Later life

Hobbies and inventions

Personal life

Tributes and legacy

The Mathematical Theory of Communication

Weaver's Contribution

Other work

Shannon's mouse

Shannon's estimate for the complexity of chess

Shannon's computer chess program

Shannon's maxim

Miscellaneous

Commemorations

Shannon centenary

Awards and honors list

Selected works

See also

References

Further reading

External links