mathematics

Margaret H. Wright

Margaret H. Wright is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Margaret H. Wright rather than just read about it. In short: Margaret H. Wright (born February 18, 1944) is an American computer scientist and mathematician.

Key takeaways

Margaret H. Wright belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Margaret H. Wright to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Margaret H. Wright from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Margaret H. Wright (born February 18, 1944) is an American computer scientist and mathematician. She is a Silver Professor of Computer Science and former chair of the Computer Science department at Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York University, with research interests in optimization, linear algebra, and scientific computing. She was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1997 for development of numerical optimization algorithms and for leadership in the applied mathematics community. She was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2005. She was the first woman to serve as President of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics.

Early life and education Wright was born in San Francisco in 1944, and spent her early childhood in Hanford, California. Both of her parents were medical doctors. At age 10, her family moved to Tucson, Arizona, where she attended junior and high school. She graduated high school in 1960 at the age of 16. She excelled in school, especially in mathematics. She went to college at Stanford University, one of the few top-ranked universities that accepted women at that time. She was interested in numerous subjects including literature, French, history, and mathematics, and she decided to major in mathematics thanks to some advice that a degree in mathematics would lead to better job opportunities than a degree in English or history. She planned to have a job because her mother had always worked. She received a B.S. degree in mathematics from Stanford University in 1964. She completed an M.S. in computer science from Stanford University in 1965. After completing her M.S., she worked at GTE Sylvania from 1965 to 1971, where she wrote software to implement mathematical simulations. As part of this work, she learned about optimization methods such as the newly published Fletcher-Powell method and linear programming. At that time, it was legal for employers to discriminate against women, and she was earning significantly less than men with lower qualifications. For this and other reasons, she decided to return to Stanford in 1971 to earn her Ph.D. Wright entered the Ph.D. program in computer science at Stanford University in 1971 and was supported by an assistantship from Gene H. Golub. During her Ph.D. studies, Philip E. Gill and Walter Murray, two researchers from the National Physical Laboratory (United Kingdom), came to visit and ended up having a profound impact on her Ph.D. and career. She served as a teaching assistant for a course taught by Walter Murray and got to know him. When Gill and Murray returned to the UK, she went as well for six months and did much of her dissertation research during this period. She returned to Stanford and obtaining her Ph.D. in 1976. Her thesis was on numerical methods for nonlinearly constrained optimization.

Scientific career After obtaining her Ph.D. in 1976, Wright joined George Dantzig's Systems Optimization Laboratory (SOL) in the Department of Operations Research at Stanford University as a Senior Research Associate. She was eventually joined at SOL by Gill Murray and Philip Gill, whom she had worked with when she was a graduate student, and Michael Saunders. They were known as the "Gang of Four" and published many scientific papers together, always using alphabetical order of their names. In 1984, Karmarkar's algorithm was announced as a polynomial-time algorithm for linear programs, and he came to visit Stanford and present the work. It was immediately clear to the Gang of Four and John Tomlin that this was a special case of barrier methods (the subject of Wright's thesis), and that barrier methods were much more useful than previously believed. In 1988, Wright moved east and joined Bell Labs, where she was ultimately promoted to Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff. She headed the Scientific Computing Research Department from 1997 to 2000. She was named a Bell Labs Fellow in 1999. Wright was involved in a number of projects during her years at Bell Labs. She worked in wireless systems engineering. She also investigated the popular Nelder–Mead method for derivative-free numerical optimization. In 2001, Wright joined the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences as the Silver Professor of Computer Science and a professor of mathematics. She served as Chair of Computer Science from 2001 to 2009.

Professional Service Wright has several in numerous service roles including chairing and serving on prize and search committees, serving on a variety of national and international advisory committees, chairing several important reviews, etc. Highlights include the following: From 1995 to 1996, she served as the (first female) president of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM). She served on the SIAM Board of Trustees from 2000 to 2005 and its council from 1987 to 1989. She was SIAM Vice President at-large from 1990 to 1993. From 1999 to 2004, she was editor-in-chief of SIAM Review. In 2010, she chaired the UK International Review of the Mathematical Sciences, Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council.

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Margaret H. Wright

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Margaret H. Wright claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Margaret H. Wright before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Margaret H. Wright ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Margaret H. Wright

In research: Margaret H. Wright appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Margaret H. Wright in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Margaret H. Wright is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1944 births, 21st-century American women, American computer scientists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Margaret H. Wright outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Margaret H. Wright in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Margaret H. Wright means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Margaret H. Wright out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Margaret H. Wright in simple terms?

Margaret H. Wright (born February 18, 1944) is an American computer scientist and mathematician.

Why does Margaret H. Wright matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Margaret H. Wright?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Margaret H. Wright.