Ken Kennedy, a computer scientist known for his pioneering work on supercomputers, died Wednesday of pancreatic cancer. He was 61.
The founder of Rice University’s computer-science department, Mr. Kennedy was one of the world’s foremost experts in parallel computing — the process of spreading tasks through large groups of computer processors instead of just one. Technology gurus credit Mr. Kennedy’s seminal research for making supercomputing accessible to scientists and engineers, according to The New York Times.
“This changed the entire landscape for high-performance computing,” said Steven Wallach, who co-founded an early supercomputing firm called Convex Computers. “Supercomputing could now be used by the masses.” —Brock Read
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