This classic book is an introduction to dynamic programming, presented by the scientist who coined the term and developed the theory in its early stages. In Dynamic Programming , Richard E. Bellman introduces his groundbreaking theory and furnishes a new and versatile mathematical tool for the treatment of many complex problems, both within and outside of the discipline. The book is written at a moderate mathematical level, requiring only a basic foundation in mathematics, including calculus. The applications formulated and analyzed in such diverse fields as mathematical economics, logistics, scheduling theory, communication theory, and control processes are as relevant today as they were when Bellman first presented them. A new introduction by Stuart Dreyfus reviews Bellman's later work on dynamic programming and identifies important research areas that have profited from the application of Bellman's theory.

This book is intended for medical students and advanced undergraduates such as physicists and mathematicians with inter-disciplinary interests, biophysicists, medical physicists, applied mathematicians and others who wish to understand medicine in mathematical terms as well as current mathematical applications in physiology and medicine. The mathematical presentation is clear and self-contained.This book, representing 15 years of work at RAND Corporation and USC on chemotherapy, pharmacokinetics and nuclear medicine, attempts to direct medical scientists towards mathematical aspects of problems in medicine. The book begins with an introduction to compartmental models and matrix theory, highlighting the advantages of the approach. Discussions on how questions in observations and testing lead to multi-point boundary value problems are presented. The potentials of the digital computer in the bio-medical field are examined. A new approach -- dynamic programming -- to overcome clinical constraints is covered in detail. The reader should obtain a broad impression of where future research opportunities in the biochemical field lie.

This is a very frank and detailed account by a leading and very active mathematician of the past decades whose contributions have had an important impact in those fields where mathematics is now an integral part. It starts from his early childhood just after the First World War to his present-day positions as professor of mathematics, electrical engineering and medicine at the USC, which in itself reflects on the diversity of interests and experiences gained through the turbulent years when American mathematics and sciences established themselves on the forefront. The story traces the tortuous path Bellman followed from Brooklyn College; the University of Wisconsin to Princeton during the war years; more than a decade with the RAND Corporation; with frequent views of more than just the academic circles, including his experiences at Los Alamos on the A-bomb project.Bellman gives highly personalised views of key personalities in mathematics, physics and other areas, and his motivations and the forces that helped shape dynamic programming and other new areas which emerged as consequences of fruitful applications of mathematics.