The narrative centers on Karl Gustafson's urgent challenge to develop software for the first US spy satellite within a tight two-week deadline. This project played a crucial role in transforming America's Cold War strategy. Through his autobiographical account, Gustafson shares an insider's perspective on the complexities and pressures of this groundbreaking endeavor, offering a unique glimpse into the intersection of technology and national security during a pivotal era.
The theories of quadratic forms and their applications appear in many parts of mathematics and the sciences. All students of mathematics have the opportunity to encounter such concepts and applications in their first course in linear algebra. This subject and its extensions to infinite dimen sions comprise the theory of the numerical range W(T). There are two competing names for W(T), namely, the numerical range of T and the field of values for T. The former has been favored historically by the func tional analysis community, the latter by the matrix analysis community. It is a toss-up to decide which is preferable, and we have finally chosen the former because it is our habit, it is a more efficient expression, and because in recent conferences dedicated to W(T), even the linear algebra commu nity has adopted it. Also, one universally refers to the numerical radius, and not to the field of values radius. Originally, Toeplitz and Hausdorff called it the Wertvorrat of a bilinear form, so other good names would be value field or form values. The Russian community has referred to it as the Hausdorff domain. Murnaghan in his early paper first called it the region of the complex plane covered by those values for an n x n matrix T, then the range of values of a Hermitian matrix, then the field of values when he analyzed what he called the sought-for region.
The book introduces Karl Gustafson's theory of antieigenvalue analysis, highlighting its diverse applications in numerical analysis, wavelets, statistics, quantum mechanics, and finance. It presents antieigenvalue analysis as a unifying framework that enhances the geometrical understanding of operator and matrix theory, offering innovative insights into established results. Aimed at specialists, the book aims to broaden the accessibility of these methods, fostering deeper exploration and understanding across various fields.
In the early morning hours of Feb. 1, 2016, Karl Gustafson became instinctively aware that something catastrophic was happening inside him. A severe headache that had persisted for days had taken a sudden turn for the worse, and a clear inner voice ordered him to obtain immediate help. With determined effort, he tapped out the digits “9-1-1” on his phone—bringing an ambulance to his door quickly and saving his life. Emergency Room doctors would soon learn that Professor Gustafson, a renowned American mathematician, had suffered a deep brain hemorrhage, and that the situation was dire. By the time his condition was diagnosed, blood had pooled into all four ventricles of Gustafson’s brain and he was comatose. Against all odds and surprising everyone, the author emerged from a near-death state to go on to what he calls his “Second Life”. This is the story of his miraculous journey of recovery, an inspirational tale of grit and determination, in his own words.