Benjamin Crawford Pierce is an American professor of computer science

Computer science

Computer science or computing science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems...

 at the University of Pennsylvania

University of Pennsylvania

The University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...

. Pierce joined Penn in 1998 from Indiana University

Indiana University Bloomington

Indiana University Bloomington is a public research university located in Bloomington, Indiana, in the United States. IU Bloomington is the flagship campus of the Indiana University system. Being the flagship campus, IU Bloomington is often referred to simply as IU or Indiana...

 and held research positions at the University of Cambridge

University of Cambridge

The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...

 and the University of Edinburgh

University of Edinburgh

The University of Edinburgh, founded in 1583, is a public research university located in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The university is deeply embedded in the fabric of the city, with many of the buildings in the historic Old Town belonging to the university...

. He received his Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University

Carnegie Mellon University

Carnegie Mellon University is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States....

 in 1991. His research includes work on programming languages, static type systems, distributed programming, mobile agents, and process calculi.

As part of his research, Pierce has led development on several open-source software

Open-source software

Open-source software is computer software that is available in source code form: the source code and certain other rights normally reserved for copyright holders are provided under a software license that permits users to study, change, improve and at times also to distribute the software.Open...

 projects, including the Unison

Unison (file synchronizer)

Unison is a file synchronization program. It is used for synchronizing files between two directories, either on one computer, or between a computer and another storage device Unison is a file synchronization program. It is used for synchronizing files between two directories, either on one...

 file synchronization

File synchronization

File synchronization in computing is the process of ensuring that computer files in two or more locations are updated via certain rules....

 utility.

Books

He is the author of one book on type systems, Types and Programming Languages

Types and Programming Languages

Types and Programming Languages, ISBN 0-262-16209-1, is a book by Benjamin C. Pierce on type systems.A review by Frank Pfenning called it "probably the single most important book in the area of programming languages in recent years."...

ISBN 0-262-16209-1. He has also edited a collection of articles to create a second volume Advanced Topics in Types and Programming Languages ISBN 0-262-16228-8. Based on the notes he collected while learning category theory

Category theory

Category theory is an area of study in mathematics that examines in an abstract way the properties of particular mathematical concepts, by formalising them as collections of objects and arrows , where these collections satisfy certain basic conditions...

during his PhD, he also published an introductory book on this topic—Basic Category Theory for Computer Scientists, ISBN 0262660717.

External links

• Prof. Pierce's Homepage