In memoriam: E. Bruce Lee

E. Bruce Lee, Vincentine Hermes-Luh Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and an IT Distinguished Professor, died April 15 at age 73.

Lee was the longtime leader of the systems and controls group in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He was a founder of the Center for Control Science and Dynamical Systems and was its codirector for many years. The strength of his reputation helped attract some of the world's top control scientists and engineers to Minnesota and also helped forge collaborations with faculty and students in several IT departments.

During his University career he also served terms as head and acting head of the electrical engineering department and as acting head of computer science.

Lee studied mechanical engineering at the University of North Dakota, earning a bachelor's degree in 1955 and a master's degree in 1956, and then received a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1960. He was a senior research engineer with Honeywell from 1956 until 1963, when he joined the University of Minnesota as an associate professor of electrical engineering.

A leading educator and scholar in his field, Lee supervised over 50 Ph.D. and numerous master's theses. His book, Foundations of Optimal Control Theory, which he coauthored with L. Markus, is considered one of the most influential textbooks in this area and has been translated into Russian and Japanese.

Lee was elected a Fellow of the IEEE and a Foreign Member of the Polish Academy of Sciences. He received the Warsaw University of Technology Medal for the development of control theory and establishment of cooperative research with Polish scientists. He held visiting professorships at California Institute of Technology, Technical University of Warsaw, Universite de Montreal, and the University of Florida, and also was a senior visiting fellow at the Science Research Council, England.

In lieu of flowers the Lee family has asked that donations be made to the Hartig Fund, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Minnesota Foundation.