A trained mathematician, George Dantzig is known as the father of linear programming and the "simplex algorithm." Working during the mid-century heyday in which industrial expansion intersected with the rise of computing power, Dantzig developed the mathematical algorithms that helped countless organizations sort through myriad possibilities to optimize their complex systems for profit and efficiency. Virtually every industry, from petroleum refining to the scheduling of airline flights, has been transformed by his work. The journal Computing in Science and Engineering named the simplex algorithm as one of the top 10 algorithms of the twentieth century. Dantzig, a Professor Emeritus of Operations Research and Computer Science, passed away in 2005.