Stephen Cole Kleene was an American mathematician and logician who made significant contributions to the fields of mathematical logic, recursion theory, and theoretical computer science. He was born on January 5, 1909, in Hartford, Connecticut, and passed away on January 25, 1994. Kleene earned his Bachelor's degree in mathematics from Amherst College in 1930 and continued his studies at Princeton University under the guidance of [[Alonzo Church]]. It was during this time that he became interested in the foundations of mathematics and logic. One of Kleene's most notable achievements is his work on the foundations of recursive function theory. In his Ph.D. dissertation published in 1936, he developed a formal system called the [[Lambda Calculus|lambda calculus]] to study computable functions and recursion. This work laid the foundation for modern computer science by providing a theoretical framework for understanding computation. Kleene also made significant contributions to formal systems and mathematical logic. He introduced a notation called "Kleene star" to represent the repetition of elements in formal languages. This notation is widely used today in various areas such as regular expressions and formal language theory. In addition to his research contributions, Kleene was a highly influential educator. He held teaching positions at several prestigious institutions including Princeton University and the University of Wisconsin–Madison. His lectures and writings on mathematical logic played a vital role in disseminating knowledge on these subjects. Kleene received numerous awards for his outstanding contributions to mathematics and logic throughout his career. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1967 and received the National Medal of Science in 1992. Stephen Cole Kleene's work continues to have a profound impact on computer science, mathematical logic, and theoretical computer science. His innovative ideas laid the groundwork for many subsequent developments in these fields, making him one of the pioneers in modern computation theory. # References ```dataview Table title as Title, authors as Authors where contains(authors, "Stephen Cole Kleene") or contains(subject, "Stephen Kleene") or contains(authors, "Stephen Kleene") ```