Larry Joseph Stockmeyer (1948 – 31 July 2004) was an American computer scientist. He was one of the pioneers in the field of computational complexity theory, and he also worked in the field of distributed computing. He died of pancreatic cancer. Career 1972: BSc in mathematics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 1972: MSc in electrical engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 1974: PhD in computer science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Supervisor: Albert R. Meyer. 1974–1982: IBM Research, Thomas J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY. 1982–November 2003: IBM Research, Almaden Research Center, San Jose, CA. October 2002–2004: University of California, Santa Cruz, Computer Science Department – Research Associate. Recognition 1996: Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery: "For several fundamental contributions to computational complexity theory, which have significantly affected the course of this field." 2007: The Edsger W. Dijkstra Prize in Distributed Computing for the paper . Notable publications — this work introduced the polynomial hierarchy. — "one of the most remarkable doctoral theses in computer science". — this work introduced alternating Turing machines. — this paper received the Dijkstra Prize in 2007. Notes References . . . . . . PhD Thesis. Includes the program of 'Larry Stockmeyer Commemoration' (21 May 2005). External links Larry Stockmeyer's Home Page. 1948 births 2004 deaths American computer scientists Theoretical computer scientists Researchers in distributed computing MIT School of Engineering alumni University of California, Santa Cruz faculty Fellows of the Association for Computing Machinery Dijkstra Prize laureates Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Science alumni