Félix Pollaczek
Félix Pollaczek was an Austrian-French engineer and mathematician, known for numerous contributions to number theory, mathematical analysis, mathematical physics and probability theory. He is best known for the Pollaczek-Khinchine formula in queueing theory, and the Meixner-Pollaczek polynomials.
Education and career
Pollaczek studied at the Technical University of Vienna, got a M.Sc. in electrical engineering from Technical University of Brno, and his Ph.D. in mathematics from University of Berlin with a dissertation titled Über die Kreiskörper der l-ten und l2-ten Einheitswurzeln, advised by Issai Schur and based on results published first in 1917.Pollaczek was employed by AEG in Berlin, worked for Reichspost. In 1933, he was fired because he was Jewish. He moved to Paris, where
he was consulting teletraffic engineer to various institutions from 1933 onwards, including the Société d'Études pour Liaisons Téléphoniques et Télégraphiques and the French National Centre for Scientific Research.
In 1977, Pollaczek was awarded the John von Neumann Theory Prize, although his age prevented him from receiving the prize in person. He was posthumously elected to the 2002 class of Fellows of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences.