New York, NY, February 21, 2007
– ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, has named Frances E.
Allen the recipient of the 2006 A.M. Turing Award for contributions
that fundamentally improved the performance of computer programs in
solving problems, and accelerated the use of high performance
computing. This award marks the first time that a woman has received
this honor. The Turing Award, first presented in 1966, and named for
British mathematician Alan M. Turing, is widely considered the "Nobel
Prize in Computing." It carries a $100,000 prize, with financial
support provided by Intel Corporation.
Allen,
an IBM Fellow Emerita at the T.J. Watson Research Center, made
fundamental contributions to the theory and practice of program
optimization, which translates the users' problem-solving language
statements into more efficient sequences of computer instructions. Her
contributions also greatly extended earlier work in automatic program
parallelization, which enables programs to use multiple processors
simultaneously in order to obtain faster results. These techniques have
made it possible to achieve high performance from computers while
programming them in languages suitable to applications. They have
contributed to advances in the use of high performance computers for
solving problems such as weather forecasting, DNA matching, and
national security functions.
"Fran
Allen's work has led to remarkable advances in compiler design and
machine architecture that are at the foundation of modern
high-performance computing," said Ruzena Bajcsy, Chair of ACM's Turing
Award Committee, and professor of Electrical and Engineering and
Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley. "Her
contributions have spanned most of the history of computer science, and
have made possible computing techniques that we rely on today in
business and technology. It is interesting to note Allen's role in
highly secret intelligence work on security codes for the organization
now known as the National Security Agency, since it was Alan Turing,
the namesake of this prestigious award, who devised techniques to help
break the German codes during World War II," said Bajcsy, who is
Emeritus Director of the Center for Information Technology Research in
the Interest of Society (CITRIS) at Berkeley.
"Fran
Allen's work on the Parallel TRANslation (PTRAN) project built on her
earlier work on program optimization," said Andrew A. Chien, Intel's
Vice President of Research. "Over the years, this foundation has
enabled the advance of programming-productivity based on the
co-evolution of higher level programming language and optimization
technologies. It is particularly timely that this award comes as
parallel computing is becoming an element of the most pervasive of
computing platforms - laptop and desktop personal computers - and the
opportunities for new and important contributions to parallel
programming and efficient implementation abound," he said.
In
1989, Allen was the first woman to be named an IBM Fellow. In 2000, IBM
created the Frances E. Allen Women in Technology Mentoring Award,
naming her as its first recipient. As her Turing Award citation notes,
she has been an inspirational mentor to younger researchers and a
leader within the computing community. She is an Advisory Council
Member of the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology, whose goal
is to increase the participation of women in all aspects of technology.
She also received the first Anita Borg Award for Technical Leadership,
which was presented at Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing
in 2004.
Background
Allen
joined IBM's T. J. Watson Research Center in 1957, to teach FORTRAN, a
revolutionary high-level programming language, to the scientists at
IBM. FORTRAN allowed scientists and engineers to write programs that
closely resembled the mathematical formulas they normally relied on.
Allen recognized the opportunity to address a grand challenge of high
performance computers - delivering the performance potential of
computers to solve problems without exposing the underlying computer
infrastructure.
Allen's 1966 paper, Program Optimization , laid the conceptual basis for systematic analysis and transformation of computer programs. Her 1970 papers, Control Flow Analysis and A Basis for Program Optimization
established "intervals" as the context for efficient and effective data
flow analysis and optimization. Much of her early work was done in
collaboration with John Cocke, an IBM computer scientist who died in
2002. Her 1971 paper with John Cocke, A Catalog of Optimizing Transformations ,
provided the first description and systematization of optimizing
transformations. She developed and implemented her methods as part of
building compilers for the IBM STRETCH-HARVEST and the experimental
Advanced Computing System. This work established the feasibility of
modern machine- and language-independent optimizers.
In
1984, she formed and led IBM's PTRAN project to address the emerging
challenge of parallel computers, which simultaneously executes related
tasks for faster results. This project led to many advances including
the concept of the program dependence graph, the primary structuring
method used by most parallelizing compilers today.
In
1995, Allen was president of the IBM Academy of Technology, a global
organization of IBM technical leaders charged with providing technical
advice to the company. Before she retired in 2002, she was a Senior
Technical Advisor to the Research Vice President for Solutions,
Applications and Services. She is a member of the National Academy of
Engineering, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the
American Philosophical Society. She was named a Fellow of ACM in 1994.
Allen
has been a member of the Computer Science and Telecommunications Board
(CSTB), the Computing Research Association (CRA) Board, and the
National Science Foundation's Computer and Information Science and
Engineering (CISE) Advisory Board. Her recent professional activities
for ACM include membership on ACM's Job Migration Task Force, which
produced the widely reported "Globalization and Offshoring of Software"
study. In addition, she was active in the ACM Special Interest Group on
Programming Languages (SIGPLAN), and has served on the editorial boards
of several ACM journals.
Among
Allen's teaching and lecturing roles were visiting professor at New
York University from 1970-73; consulting professor at Stanford
University; the Chancellor's Distinguished Lecturer and Mackay Lecturer
at the University of California, Berkeley in 1988-89; and Regents
Lecturer at the University of California, San Diego in 1997. She was
awarded Honorary Doctor of Science degrees from the University of
Alberta in 1991; from Pace University in 1999; and from the University
of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign in 2004. She graduated from Albany State
Teachers College - now the State University of New York at Albany -
with a degree in mathematics. She received a master's degree in
mathematics at the University of Michigan.
ACM will present the Turing Award at the annual ACM Awards Banquet on June 9, 2007, in San Diego, CA.
About the ACM A.M. Turing Award
The ACM A.M. Turing Award was named for Alan M. Turing, the British
mathematician who articulated the mathematical foundation and limits of
computing, and who was a key contributor to the Allied cryptanalysis of
the German Enigma cipher during World War II. Since its inception, the
Turing Award has honored the computer scientists and engineers who
created the systems and underlying theoretical foundations that have
propelled the information technology industry. For additional
information, click on http://www.acm.org/awards/taward.html
About ACM
ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery http://www.acm.org,
is an educational and scientific society uniting the world's computing
educators, researchers and professionals to inspire dialogue, share
resources and address the field's challenges. ACM strengthens the
profession's collective voice through strong leadership, promotion of
the highest standards, and recognition of technical excellence. ACM
supports the professional growth of its members by providing
opportunities for life-long learning, career development, and
professional networking.
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