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Stanley Osher

Stanley Osher 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 Stanley Osher rather than just read about it. In short: Stanley Osher (born April 24, 1942) is an American mathematician, known for his many contributions in shock capturing, level-set methods, and PDE-based methods in computer vision and image processing. Osher is a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Director of Special Projects in the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IPAM) and member of the California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI)…

Stanley Osher — main illustration
Stanley Osher — illustration

Key takeaways

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

Reference excerpt

Stanley Osher (born April 24, 1942) is an American mathematician, known for his many contributions in shock capturing, level-set methods, and PDE-based methods in computer vision and image processing. Osher is a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Director of Special Projects in the Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics (IPAM) and member of the California NanoSystems Institute (CNSI) at UCLA.

Education and career Osher received a bachelor's degree from Brooklyn College in 1962. He continued his studies at New York University, where he received a master's degree in 1964 and completed his Ph.D. in 1966. After two years working at the Brookhaven National Laboratories, he joined the University of California, Berkeley as an assistant professor of mathematics in 1968. He moved to Stony Brook University as an associate professor in 1970, and there was promoted to full professor in 1975. He moved again to the University of California, Los Angeles Department of Mathematics in 1977. He co-founded a spinoff company, Cognitech, in 1988, and remained affiliated with Cognitech until 1995.

Recognition Osher was a Fulbright Fellow in 1971, an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow, 1972–1974 an SERC Fellow in England in 1982, and a US-Israel BSF Fellow in 1986. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2005, to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2009, and to the National Academy of Engineering in 2018. He was named as a Fellow of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics in 2009, and of the American Mathematical Society in 2013. He is a 1992 recipient of the NASA Public Service Group Achievement Award, the 2002 recipient of the Computational Mechanics Award of the Japan Society of Mechanical Engineering, the 2003 recipient of the ICIAM Pioneer Prize, the 2005 recipient of the SIAM Kleinman Prize, the 2007 recipient of the Computational and Applied Sciences Award of the United States Association for Computational Mechanics, and the 2007 recipient of the International Cooperation Award, given at the International Congress of Chinese Mathematicians. He received the 2013 John von Neumann Lecture prize from SIAM, the 2014 Carl Friedrich Gauss Prize, and the 2016 William Benter Prize in Applied Mathematics. He has honorary doctorates from ENS Cachan in France in 2006 and from Hong Kong Baptist University in 2009. He was a plenary speaker at the 2010 International Congress of Mathematicians.

Books authored Osher's books include:

Osher, Stanley (2003). Level set methods and dynamic implicit surfaces. New York: Springer. ISBN 978-0-387-22746-7. OCLC 53224633. Osher, Stanley (2003). Geometric level set methods in imaging, vision, and graphics. New York: Springer. ISBN 978-0-387-21810-6. OCLC 56066930. Glowinski, R (2016). Splitting methods in communication, imaging, science, and engineering. Cham, Switzerland: Springer. ISBN 978-3-319-41589-5. OCLC 967938355.

See also James Sethian, co-developer of level-set methods.

References

External links Osher's home page at UCLA Stanley Osher publications indexed by Google Scholar

Illustrations

Stanley Osher illustration

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Stanley Osher

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Stanley Osher 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 Stanley Osher 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 Stanley Osher 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 Stanley Osher

In research
Stanley Osher 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 Stanley Osher 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
Stanley Osher is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1942 births, 20th-century American mathematicians, 21st-century American Jews, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life
Look for Stanley Osher 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 Stanley Osher in 20 minutes

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

Frequently asked questions

What is Stanley Osher in simple terms?

Stanley Osher (born April 24, 1942) is an American mathematician, known for his many contributions in shock capturing, level-set methods, and PDE-based methods in computer vision and image processing. Osher is a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Director of Special Proj…

Why does Stanley Osher 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 Stanley Osher?

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 Stanley Osher.

Tags

  • 1942 births
  • 20th-century American mathematicians
  • 21st-century American Jews
  • 21st-century American mathematicians
  • Brooklyn College alumni
  • Computational fluid dynamicists
  • Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences alumni
  • Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
  • Fellows of the American Mathematical Society
  • Fellows of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
  • Jewish American scientists
  • Living people

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