On Thursday, May 17, 2018, Ing. František Matúš, CSc., a Member and former Deputy Chair of the Board of the Institute of Information Theory and Automation, passed away. By his death, the Institute is losing a distinguished researcher in the field of Information Theory, whose professional interests covered not only Probability Theory but also Algebra, Cryptography, and Matroid Theory.
Fero, as he was called by his colleagues and friends, was associated with the Institute of Information Theory and Automation for all his professional life. He joined the Institute in 1984 after graduating from the Faculty of Nuclear Sciences and Physical Engineering of the Czech Technical University in Prague. He received the CSc. title (that time's equivalent of today's Ph.D.) from the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences four years later. Thanks to his deep knowledge in several parts of mathematics, he co-operated with a number of scientists from different fields. The longest and perhaps the most fruitful was his co-operation with Prof. Imre Cziszár, focused on the properties of exponential families; and his most cited paper, written jointly with Prof. Jan Flusser, is from the field of Image Processing. For his complete bibliography, follow this link.
We will remember Fero Matúš as a truly renaissance person: he was a mathematician, musician and was also gifted for languages. With his death the Institute of Information Theory and Automation has lost not only a top-ranking scientist but also a competent organizer. He was active in organizing many conferences and seminars; and was, for many years, the Head of the Department of Decision-Making Theory. He will also be missed at Charles University, where he taught at Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, namely, at the Department of Probability and Mathematical Statistics and at the Department of Algebra. Of course his death is, first and foremost, an appaling blow to his family, to whom we offer our heartfelt condolences. He was a selfless husband and a father proud of his son. He was also a considerate son himself, and his parents were appropriately proud of him.
