John D. Hunter

John D. Hunter (August 1, 1968 – August 28, 2012) was an American neurobiologist and the original author of Matplotlib.

Biography Hunter was brought up in Dyersburg, Tennessee, and attended The McCallie School. He graduated from Princeton University in 1990 and obtained a Ph.D. in neurobiology from the University of Chicago in 2004. In 2005, he joined TradeLink Securities as a Quantitative Analyst. Later, he was one of the founding directors of NumFOCUS Foundation.

Matplotlib Hunter initially developed Matplotlib during his postdoctoral research in neurobiology to visualize electrocorticography (ECoG) data of epilepsy patients. Matplotlib was used for data visualization during the 2008 landing of the Phoenix spacecraft on Mars and for the creation of the first image of a black hole.

Personal life Hunter married Miriam Sierig and had three daughters: Clara, Ava, and Rahel.

Hunter was diagnosed with malignant colon cancer and died from cancer treatment complications on August 28, 2012. His memorial service was held at the University of Chicago's Rockefeller Chapel (also the location of his Ph.D. graduation) on October 1, 2012.

Awards Two weeks after Hunter's death, the Python Software Foundation announced it had voted unanimously to create its Distinguished Service Award, intended as the foundation's highest honor, and issued the first award to Hunter.

Legacy From 2013 onwards, the SciPy Conference has hosted the annual John Hunter Excellence in Plotting Contest in his honor, with a $1000 prize to continue the advancement of scientific plotting.