Kathryn Brenda MacGibbon-Taylor (July 31, 1944 – October 7, 2022) was a Canadian mathematician, statistician, and decision scientist. She was a professor of mathematics at the Université du Québec à Montréal[1] and was affiliated with the Group for Research in Decision Analysis.[2]
Brenda MacGibbon | |
---|---|
Born | July 31, 1944 |
Died | October 7, 2022 Montreal, Quebec, Canada | (aged 78)
Education | |
Spouse | John Taylor |
Children | 3 |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Mathematics |
Thesis | K-Analytic Spaces and Countable Operations in Topology (1970) |
Doctoral advisor | Donald A. Dawson |
Education and career
editMacGibbon began her career in pure mathematics, at McGill University. She earned a master's degree there in 1966, working with Michael Herschorn on differential equations,[3] and completed a Ph.D. in 1970, with a dissertation on topology supervised by Donald A. Dawson.[4][5]
As well as McGill and the Université du Québec à Montréal, she has also been affiliated with the Department of Decision Sciences and Management Information Systems at Concordia University in Montreal, where she was hired in 1986.[6] By 1993 she had moved to the Université du Québec à Montréal.[4]
Research
editAlthough MacGibbon's research has covered a wide range of topics in statistics,[4] including applications of statistics in the study of premenstrual syndrome,[7] and the use of smart shoes to monitor the rehabilitation of patients with hip fractures,[8] she was particularly known for her work in theoretical statistics on minimax estimators with constrained parameters.[4]
Recognition
editMacGibbon became the first woman to chair the Statistical Sciences Grant Selection Committee of the Canadian Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, in 1993.[4] She was a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics.[9]
Personal life
editMacGibbon was married to John Taylor, with whom she had 3 children. She died from complications of Alzheimer's disease and ALS on October 7, 2022, at the age of 78.[10]
References
edit- ^ "Professeurs retraités" [Retired professors], Faculté des sciences: Site administratif du département de mathématiques (in French), Université du Québec à Montréal, retrieved 2020-08-29
- ^ Brenda MacGibbon, Associated member, GERAD, Group for Research in Decision Analysis (GERAD), archived from the original on 2020-09-28, retrieved 2020-08-29
- ^ MacGibbon, Brenda (1966), Oscillation theorems for ordinary differential equations, Master's thesis, McGill University
- ^ Jump up to: a b c d e Thompson, Mary E. (2014), "Reflections on women in statistics in Canada", in Lin, Xihong; Genest, Christian; Banks, David L.; Molenberghs, Geert; Scott, David W.; Wang, Jane-Ling (eds.), Past, Present, and Future of Statistical Science, CRC Press, pp. 203–216, ISBN 9781482204988. See in particular p. 208.
- ^ Brenda MacGibbon at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
- ^ "At a glance" (PDF), The Thursday Report, Concordia University, p. 3, 27 November 1986, archived from the original (PDF) on 2021-11-19, retrieved 2020-08-29
- ^ Solomon, Heather (22 March 1990), "New statistical tool helps zero in on PMS" (PDF), The Thursday Report, Concordia University, p. 7, archived from the original (PDF) on 2021-11-18, retrieved 2020-08-29
- ^ Goldsobel, Gady (13 February 2017), ""Smart Soles" Help Patients Recover From A Broken Hip", Healthcanal
- ^ Honored IMS Fellows, Institute of Mathematical Statistics, retrieved 2020-08-29
- ^ "Kathryn Brenda MacGibbon(Brenda)". Remembering. Retrieved 2022-10-11.