Richard P. Stanley

Richard Peter Stanley (born June 23, 1944 in New York City, New York) is the Norman Levinson Professor of Applied Mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He received his Ph.D. at Harvard University in 1971 under the supervision of Gian-Carlo Rota. He is an expert in the field of combinatorics and its applications to other mathematical disciplines.

Stanley is known for his two-volume book Enumerative Combinatorics (1986–1999). He is also the author of Combinatorics and Commutative Algebra (1983) and well over 100 research articles in mathematics. He has served as thesis advisor to more than 58 doctoral students, many of whom have had distinguished careers in combinatorial research.

Stanley's distinctions include membership in the National Academy of Sciences (elected in 1995), the 2001 Leroy P. Steele Prize for mathematical exposition, the 2003 Schock Prize, a plenary lecture at the International Congress of Mathematicians (in Madrid, Spain), and election in 2012 as a fellow of the American Mathematical Society.

• Stanley, Richard P. (1996). Combinatorics and Commutative Algebra, 2nd ed. ISBN 0-8176-4369-9.
• Stanley, Richard P. (1997, 1999). Enumerative Combinatorics, Volumes 1 and 2. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-55309-1, 0-521-56069-1.