doctoral_advisor thesis_year death_place death_date work_institution birth_place thesis_title field birth_date thesis_url article_title name alma_mater
erik demaine 2008 new york 05 june 2012 at & t labs craiova , romania lower bound techniques for data structures computer science 17 july 1982 http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/45866 mihai pătrașcu
 mihai pătraşcu massachusetts institute of technology
mihai pătrașcu

mihai pătraşcu -lrb- 17 july 1982 -- 5 june 2012 -rrb- was a romanian computer scientist at at&t labs in florham park , new jersey , usa .
as a high school student , pătraşcu won multiple medals at the international olympiad in informatics .
he completed his undergraduate and graduate studies in computer science at massachusetts institute of technology , completing his thesis under the supervision of erik demaine in 2008 .
pătraşcu 's work was concerned with fundamental questions about basic data structures .
pătraşcu received the machtey award for the best student paper at the symposium on foundations of computer science in 2008 , and the presburger award from the european association for theoretical computer science in 2012 , for breaking `` many old barriers on fundamental data structure problems , not only revitalizing but also revolutionizing a field that was almost silent for over a decade . ''
pătraşcu died in 2012 after suffering from brain cancer for a year and a half .
