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Michael O. Rabin
Computer scientist

Michael O. Rabin

Famoose for

Advancing automata theory and probabilistic algorithms.

Finite Automata and Their Decision Problems · Primality testing

Born
1 September 1931
Birthplace
Wrocław
Died
14 April 2026

More people

Ada LovelaceRecognising what a programmable machine could do beyond arithmetic.Alan TuringHelping break Enigma and laying foundations for computer science.Grace HopperHelping make computer programming readable in English-like language.

Michael O. Rabin

Michael O. Rabin was a computer scientist whose research helped establish theoretical computing and modern approaches to cryptography.

Early life

Education

Grew up in Haifa, studied at the Hebrew University and completed a Princeton doctorate in 1956.

Career

  1. 1959

    Automata paper

    Published joint work with Dana Scott.

  2. 1976

    Turing Award

    Shared the award with Scott.

  3. 1981

    Harvard

    Joined Harvard’s computer science faculty.

Contributions

Finite Automata and Their Decision Problems

Introduced influential nondeterministic models.

Primality testing

Developed the probabilistic approach known as the Miller–Rabin test.

Rabin–Karp search

Co-developed a string-search algorithm using hashing.

Beyond research

Family

His daughter Tal Rabin also became a computer scientist.

Sources & photo creditBiography and career ↗Biographical references ↗Additional biographical source ↗

Original photograph. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.

Photo: Konrad Jacobs, Erlangen, Copyright is MFO. CC BY-SA 2.0 de · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.