Gordon David Plotkin was born on September 9, 1946. He is a computer scientist who studies theory at the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh. Plotkin is most famous for creating a method called structural operational semantics (SOS) and for his work on denotational semantics. His notes on A Structural Approach to Operational Semantics had a big impact on the field. He has also made important contributions to many other areas of computer science.

Education

Plotkin studied at the University of Glasgow and the University of Edinburgh. He received his Bachelor of Science degree in 1967 and his PhD in 1972, with guidance from Rod Burstall.

Career and research

Plotkin has stayed at Edinburgh University and, along with Burstall and Robin Milner, helped start the Laboratory for Foundations of Computer Science (LFCS). He has taught doctoral students including Luca Cardelli, Philippa Gardner, Doug Gurr, Eugenio Moggi, and Lǐ Wèi.

In 1992, Plotkin was chosen as a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS). He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) and a member of Academia Europæa and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He received the Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award. In 2012, Plotkin won the Milner Award for "his fundamental research into programming semantics with lasting impact on both the principles and design of programming languages." His nomination for the Royal Society reads: