Professor Ed Coffman has been awarded the 2011 Harold Larnder Prize by the the Canadian Operational Research Society. Prof. Coffman, who retired from teaching in 2008 but is still fully engaged in research and professional activities, delivered the Lardner Memorial Lecture at the Society's National Conference in June.
Harold Larnder was a prominent Operational Researcher who made numerous major contributions including the development of the radar-based air defence system during the Battle of Britain. The prize recognizes individuals who achieve international distinction in operational research. The 2011 award celebrates Prof. Coffman's multiple contributions employing the tools of combinatorial optimization along with applied probability and stochastic processes. Most recently, Prof. Coffman's research has been directed toward Internet congestion, peer-to-peer networks, self-assembly processes of molecular computing, local-rule algorithms in sensor networks, and dynamic spectrum pooling in wireless communications.