Monroe D. Donsker

Monroe David Donsker (October 17, 1924 – June 8, 1991) was an American mathematician and a professor of mathematics at New York University (NYU). His research interest was probability theory.^[1]

Monroe David Donsker
Born	(1924-10-17)October 17, 1924 Burlington, Iowa, USA
Died	June 8, 1991(1991-06-08) (aged 66) New York City, USA
Education	University of Minnesota
Known for	Donsker’s theorem Donsker–Varadhan variational formula
Scientific career
Institutions	Cornell University University of Minnesota New York University
Doctoral advisor	Robert Horton Cameron
Doctoral students	Glen E. Baxter

Education and career

Donsker was born in Burlington, Iowa. He received a Ph.D. in mathematics at the University of Minnesota in 1948 under the supervision of Robert Horton Cameron.^[2] He became a professor at NYU's Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences in 1962, about a year before his frequent co-author S.R.S. Varadhan started working there. Before joining NYU, Donsker taught at Cornell University and the University of Minnesota. His doctoral students include Glen E. Baxter.

Donsker also served as chair of the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, a U.S. government panel responsible for student exchange programs, after being appointed by presidents Ford and Carter.^[1]

In probability theory, Donsker is known for his proof of the Donsker invariance principle which shows the convergence in distribution of a rescaled random walk to the Wiener process.

Personal life

Donsker was married to Mary Davis (1923 – 2013), who was a watercolor artist with a degree in economics from University of Minnesota.^[3]

See also

• Donsker classes