Felipe Cucker

Juan Felipe Cucker Farkas (born 1958) is an Uruguayan mathematician and theoretical computer scientist who has done research into the complexity theory of the Blum–Shub–Smale computational model and the complexity of numerical algorithms in linear programming and numerical algebraic geometry.

Biography

Cucker was born in Montevideo in 1958. Due to the situation in Uruguay in the 70s, he emigrated to Spain to study the bachelor of mathematics at the University of Barcelona,

From 1987 to 1992 Cucker was professor at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia. where he started his long-term collaboration with Lenore Blum, Michael Shub, and Steve Smale.

In 2006 Cucker was named foreign member of the Royal Academy of Sciences and Arts of Barcelona.

From 2017 to 2019 Cucker was Einstein Visiting Fellow of the Berlin Mathematical School and Technische Universität Berlin.

In 2019, the conference Complexity of numerical computation: A conference in honor of Felipe Cucker was organised at the Technische Universität Berlin in Berlin celebrating his work.

Since 2018 he is Head of the Mathematics Department at City University of Hong Kong.

Work

During the 90s, he worked in the complexity classes that appear when dealing with the Blum–Shub–Smale machine. In 1998, he co-authored one of the fundamental books in this topic, Complexity and Real Computation, together with Lenore Blum, Michael Shub, and Steve Smale.

In 2007 together with Steve Smale he proposed the so-called Cucker-Smale flocking model. This model, which has received extensive attention in mathematics and other fields, plays an important role in the mathematical study of flocking dynamics.

In 2011 together with Peter Bürgisser he contributed to the solution of Smale's 17th problem.

Selected publications