Arto Salomaa

Arto Salomaa ( born June 6, 1934 in Turku ) is a Finnish computer scientist.

Salomaa studied at the University of Turku ( where his father was a professor of philosophy ) with the degree (MA ) in 1954, was from 1956 to 1957 at the University of California, Berkeley with John Myhill, 1959 received a licentiate in 1959 at the University of Helsinki and in 1960 doctorate at Kustaa Inkeri at the University of Turku in Mathematics ( on the Composition of Functions of Several Variables Ranging over a finite set). , where he was an assistant from 1957. From 1965 he was professor of mathematics at the University of Oulu and from 1966 in Turku. In 1998 he retired.

He is known for his contributions to the theory of automata and formal language theory. In Europe it is one of the pioneers in these fields, and author and co-editor of numerous books.

He spent two years as a visiting professor at the University of Western Ontario in Canada from 1966 to 1968 ( and 1981/82 ) and 1973 to 1975 for two years at the University of Aarhus.

In 2004 he received the EATCS Award. 1979 to 1985 he was president of the European Association for Theoretical Computer Science ( EATCS ). He is much honorary doctorates ( outside Finland Bucharest, Szeged, University of Magdeburg, Graz, Riga, Iasi ) and a member of the Finnish Academy of Sciences. Every four years starting in 1975, 1989 and 1995, he held a research professorship at the Academy of Finland. He was one of the twelve Fellows of the Academy of Finland, 2001.

He has been married since 1959 and has two children.

Writings

• Theory of Automata, Pergamon Press 1969
• Formal Languages ​​, Academic Press 1987 German translation: Formal Languages ​​, Springer Verlag 1979