Gerhard Pfister

Gerhard Pfister is a professor of Mathematics at the University of Kaiserslautern. He holds the academic rank of Professor and specializes in Singularity Theory, Computer Algebra, Algebraic Geometry, and Complex Analysis. His career includes positions at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and University of Kaiserslautern, where he served as a professor from 1993 until his retirement in 2012, followed by a Senior Professorship until 2016. He has supervised numerous Ph.D. students, many of whom contributed to areas like computational algebra and singularity theory.

Education: Gerhard Pfister earned his Diplom in Mathematics (1970) and Dr. rer. nat. (1971) from Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. He habilitated in 1976 and became a professor there in 1983 before moving to Kaiserslautern in 1993.

Research Interests: Pfister's work focuses on singularity theory, computational algebra, and the development of the SINGULAR computer algebra system. His research bridges theoretical and algorithmic aspects of algebraic geometry and commutative algebra, with contributions to Gröbner bases, standard bases, and modular computation techniques. He has co-authored foundational textbooks and over 140 publications.

Key Contributions: Pfister is a co-developer of the SINGULAR software, a leading system for polynomial computations in algebraic geometry and singularity theory. His work includes algorithmic approaches to primary decomposition, normalization of rings, and classification of singularities. He has also contributed to the theoretical underpinnings of Neron desingularization and semicontinuity in algebraic geometry.

Grants & Awards: While no specific awards are listed, his sustained contributions to computational algebra and singularity theory have had significant impact. He has supervised over 25 Ph.D. students and co-authored multiple influential books.

Labs/Teams: He is a core contributor to the SINGULAR project and collaborates actively with researchers in computational commutative algebra and algebraic geometry.