Martin Zachariasen is now Doctor of Science

Accompanied by great applaus from the audience as well as plaudits from the opponents, DIKU's head of department Martin Zachariasen on Friday 21st May 2010 became Doctor of Science, defending his dissertation entitled: Fixed Orientation Interconnection Problems: Theroy, Algorithms and Applications.

Following the welcome address by Dean Nils O. Andersen of the Science Faculty, Martin Zachariasen gave a brief introduction to the theme and problems dealt with in his dissertation - which in very short terms can be explained as introducing a new paradigm for routing chip wires and interconnections using a general architecture with more than two fixed orientations and allowing wires to run in arbitrary directions, as opposed to the traditional "Manhattan architecture" (horizontal and vertical) presently used in the chip manufacturing industry.

Being the first official opponent Professor Ronald Graham, Dept. of Computer Science and Engineering, UCSD La Jolla, USA, drew historical lines from Martin's research work within the Steiner Tree problem of interconnecting a number of points with the shortest possible lines back to the Age of Enlightenment, proving that famous mathematical researchers in the 18th century have cudgeled their brains with the very same problems even before Jakob Steiner, whom this mathematical problem has been accredited, was more than a baby.

Ronald Graham then questioned a few assumptions of the dissertation, such as "What is the optimal solution and how is it proven?, When do we, incidentally, get quantum computers? and How is the problem of upscaling the number of points solved - and into how many dimensions?"

The second official opponent Professor Jens Vygen, of the Research Institute for Discrete Mathematics, University of Bonn, Germany, also challenged some of the assumptions of the dissertation pointing out a number of possible obstacles that may be appear to be tricky in practice when several individual generalisations are combined into one algorithm.

Both opponents spoke highly of the complex research work of Martin Zachariasen and strongly urged the newly fledged doctor to convert the dissertation into a "real book" about the Steiner Tree problem and related research.

As the single non-official opponent Associate professor at DIKU, Pawel Winter, mounted the podium with questions regarding generalisations.

The defence was followed by an enjoyable reception in some of the University of Copenhagen's most distinguished premises. Here are a few highlights.


Martin Zachariasen, Dr.Scient., Head of the Dept. of Computer Science, University of Copenhagen at the platform.	Welcome and introduction by Dean Niels O. Andersen, Faculty of Science, University of Copenhagen


From left: Pawel Winter, DIKU, Dean Nils O. Andersen, Ronald Graham UCSD La Jolla, USA and Jens Vygen, University of Bonn	From left: Prof. Doreen A. Thomas, University of Melbourne, in conversation with Martin Zachariasen and Nils O. Andersen

From left: Jens Vygen, U. of Bonn, Doreen A. Thomas and Marcus Brazil, U. of Melbourne	Former and present students and resear-chers at DIKU celebrated the new Dr.Scient.

From left: Chairman of the Assessment Commitee Jakob Krarup, Prof. Emeritus, DSc & h.c. and Opponent Ronald Graham	From left: Jakob Krarup and Fritz Henglein, Professor M.S.O. at DIKU, and Head of the Algorithms and Prog.Lang. Research Group.