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Wikipedia / Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science

The IEEE Annual Symposium on Foundations of Computer Science (FOCS) is an academic conference in the field of theoretical computer science. FOCS is sponsored by the IEEE Computer Society.

As writes, FOCS and its annual Association for Computing Machinery counterpart STOC (the Symposium on Theory of Computing) are considered the two top conferences in theoretical computer science, considered broadly: they "are forums for some of the best work throughout theory of computing that promote breadth among theory of computing researchers and help to keep the community together." includes regular attendance at FOCS and STOC as one of several defining characteristics of theoretical computer scientists.

Awards

The Knuth Prize for outstanding contributions to theoretical computer science is presented alternately at FOCS and STOC. Works of the highest quality presented at the conference are awarded the Best Paper Award. In addition, the Machtey Award is presented to the best student-authored paper in FOCS.

History

In 1960–1965, FOCS was known as the Symposium on Switching Circuit Theory and Logical Design, and in 1966–1974 it was known as the Symposium on Switching and Automata Theory. The current name has been used since 1975. The publisher uses the acronym SFCS on their web sites for the conferences in 1975 to 1987.

The cover pages of the conference feature an artwork entitled synapse, by Alvy Ray Smith; Smith donated the original artwork to the Simons Institute in 2023.

Location

FOCS is almost exclusively held in North America, and in particular in the United States, with few exceptions.

Year

PC and Local Chairs

Location

Steering Committee

Test of Time Award Committee

1961

1962

1963

1964

Princeton, NJ

1965

1966

1967

1968

1969

1970

1971

1972

1973

1974

1975

Daniel Rosenkrantz (PC Chair), Eugene Lawler (Local Chair)

Berkeley

1976

Michael Fischer (PC Chair), Meera Blattner (Local Chair)

Houston

1977

Paul Young (PC Chair), John Savage (Local Chair)

Providence

1978

Nancy Lynch (PC Chair), William Rounds (Local Chair)

Ann Arbor

1979

Rao Kosaraju (PC Chair), Rolando Peinado (Local Chair)

San Juan, Puerto Rico

1980

Syracuse

1981

Arnold Rosenberg (PC Chair), Patrick Fischer (Local Chair)

Nashville

1982

Chicago

1983

Lawrence Snyder (PC Chair), Peter Downey (Local Chair)

Tucson

1984

Singer Island

1985

Robert Tarjan (PC Chair), Eugene Luks (Local Chair)

Portland

1986

John Hopcroft (PC Chair), Charles Rackoff (Local Chair)

Toronto

Ashok Chandra (TCMF Chair)

1987

Tom Leighton (PC Chair), Seymour Ginsburg (Local Chair), Ming-Deh Huang (Local Chair)

Los Angeles

"

1988

White Plains

1989

Zvi Galil (PC Chair), Jon Reif (Local Chair)

Research Triangle Park

Christos Papadimitriou (TCMF Chair)

1990

Mihalis Yannakakis (PC Chair), Jonathan Turner (Local Chair)

St. Louis

"

1991

Mike Sipser (PC Chair), Tom Leighton (Local Chair), Alok Aggarwal (Local Chair)

San Juan, Puerto Rico

"

1992

Michael Luby (PC Chair), Gary Miller (Local Chair)

Pittsburgh

1993

Leonidas J. Guibas (PC Chair), Andrei Broder (Local Chair)

Palo Alto

1994

Shafi Goldwasser (PC Chair), Sorin Istrail (Local Chair)

Santa Fe

1995

Prabhakar Raghavan (PC Chair), Aditi Dhagat (Local Chair), Rene Peralta (Local Chair)

Milwaukee

1996

Martin Tompa (PC Chair), Carl Smith (Local Chair)

Burlington

1997

Anna Karlin (PC Chair), Victor Milenkovic (Local Chair)

Miami Beach

1998

Rajeev Motwani, Michael Mitzenmacher (Local Chair)

Palo Alto

1999

Paul Beame (PC Chair), Piotr Berman (Local Chair)

New York

2000

Avrim Blum (PC Chair), Marek Chrobak (Local Chair), Tao Jiang (Local Chair)

Redondo Beach

2001

Moni Naor (PC Chair), Lawrence Larmore (Local Chair), Wolfgang Bein

Las Vegas

2002

Bernard Chazelle (PC Chair) Arvind Gupta (Local Chair)

Vancouver, Canada

2003

Madhu Sudan (PC Chair), Michael Mitzenmacher (Local Chair)

Cambridge

2004

Eli Upfal(PC Chair), Giuseppe F. Italiano (Local Chair)

Rome, Italy

2005

Eva Tardos (PC Chair), Avrim Blum (Local Chair), Anupam Gupta (Local Chair)

Pittsburgh

2006

Sanjeev Arora, Satish Rao (Local Chair)

Berkeley

2007

Alistair Sinclair (PC Chair), Philip Klein (Local Chair), Anna Lysyanskaya (Local Chair), Claire Mathieu (Local Chair)

Providence

2008

R. Ravi (PC Chair), Sudipto Guha (Local Chair), Sanjeev Khanna (Local Chair), Sampath Kannan (Local Chair)

Philadelphia

Paul Beame (TCMF Chair)

2009

Dan Spielman (PC Chair), David Shmoys (General co-Chair), Milena Mihail (Local Chair), Prasad Tetali (Local Chair)

Atlanta

"

2010

Luca Trevisan (PC Chair), Larry Larmore (Local Chair)

Las Vegas

"

2011

Rafail Ostrovsky (PC Chair), Marek Chrobak (Local Chair), Neal Yong (Local Chair),

Palm Springs

"

2012

Tim Roughgarden (PC Chair), Rebecca Wright (Local Chair), Lisa Zhang (Local Chair), Boaz Barak (Workshop Chair), Avrim Blum (Workshop Chair)

New Brunswick

David Shmoys (TCMF Chair)

2013

Omer Reingold (PC Chair), Christos Papadimitriou (Local Chair), Umesh Vazirani (Local Chair), Moses Charikar (Workshop Chair), Chris Umans (Workshop Chair)

Berkeley

"

2014

Boaz Barak (PC Chair), Rebecca Wright (Local Chair), Lisa Zhang (Local Chair), Sanjeev Khanna (Workshop Chair), Kunal Talwar (Workshop Chair)

Philadelphia

"

2015

Venkatesan Guruswami (PC Chair), Kristin Kane (Local Chair), Prasad Raghavendra, Luca Trevisan

Berkeley

Rafail Ostrovsky (TCMF Chair)

2016

Irit Dinur (PC Chair), Rebecca Wright (Local Chair), Lisa Zhang (Local Chair), Alexandr Andoni (Workshop Chair), Aleksander Mądry (Workshop Chair)

New Brunswick

"

2017

Chris Umans (PC Chair), Andrew Jan (Local Chair), Prasad Raghavendra (Local Chair), Aleksander Mądry (Workshop Chair), James R. Lee (Workshop Chair)

Berkeley

"

2018

Mikkel Thorup (PC Chair), Adi Rosén (Local Chair), Sophie Laplante (Local co-Chair), Alessandro Luongo (Local co-Chair), Robert Kleinberg (Workshop Chair), James R. Lee (Workshop Chair)

Paris, France

Yuval Rabani (TCMF Chair), Shang-Hua Teng (TCMF Vice Chair), Avrim Blum, Shafi Goldwasser, Rafail Ostrovsky, Toniann Pitassi

2019

David Zuckerman (PC Chair), Michael Dinitz (Local Chair), Maria-Florina Balcan (Workshop Chair), Robert Kleinberg (Workshop Chair)

Baltimore

"

Paul Beame, Allan Borodin, Uriel Feige, Monika Henzinger, Johan Håstad (chair), Mihalis Yannakakis (inaugural award)

2020

Sandy Irani (PC Chair), Debmalya Panigrahi (Local Chair), Kamesh Munagala (Local Chair), Maria-Florina Balcan (Workshop Chair), Alexander Sherstov (Workshop Chair)

Virtual (planned for Raleigh/Durham)

"

Paul Beame (chair), Uriel Feige, Anna Karlin, Yishay Mansour, Claire Mathieu, Luca Trevisan

2021

Nisheeth Vishnoi (PC Chair), Alexandra Kolla (Local/Finance Chair), Vincent Cohen-Addad (Workshop Chair), Alexander Sherstov (Workshop Chair)

Virtual (planned for Denver)

"

Russell Impagliazzo, Yael Tauman Kalai, Anna Karlin, Yishay Mansour, Michael Saks, Luca Trevisan (chair)

2022

Jelani Nelson (PC chair), Alexandra Kolla (Local Chair), Rong Ge (Finance Chair), Vincent Cohen-Addad (Workshop Chair), Henry Yuen (Workshop Chair)

Denver

Shang-Hua Teng (TCMF Chair), Venkatesan Guruswami (TCMF Vice Chair), Avrim Blum, Shafi Goldwasser, Rafail Ostrovsky, Toniann Pitassi, Yuval Rabani

Russell Impagliazzo, Yael Tauman Kalai, Michael Saks (chair), Alistair Sinclair, Éva Tardos, David Zuckerman

2023

Amit Sahai (PC Chair), Shubhangi Saraf (PC Co-chair), Thomas Vidick (PC Co-chair), Alexandra Kolla (General Chair), Pravesh Kothari (Workshop Chair), Henry Yuen (Workshop Chair)

Santa Cruz

"

Jin-Yi Cai, Faith Ellen, Leonard Schulman, Alistair Sinclair, Éva Tardos, David Zuckerman (chair)

2024

Santosh Vempala (PC Chair), Aravindan Vijayaraghavan (General Chair), Lev Reyzin (General Chair), Mohsen Ghaffari (Workshop Chair), Pravesh Kothari (Workshop Chair)

Chicago

Ran Canetti (TCMF Chair), Rocco Servedio (TCMF Vice Chair)

Jin-Yi Cai (chair), Julia Chuzhoy, Constantinos Daskalakis, Faith Ellen, Shafi Goldwasser, Leonard Schulman

2025

Ran Raz (PC Chair), Rotem Oshman (PC Co-chair), Clément Canonne (General Chair), Troy Lee (Finance Chair), Mohsen Ghaffari (Workshop Chair), Dakshita Khurana (Workshop Chair)

Sydney, Australia

Ran Canetti (TCMF Chair), Rocco Servedio (TCMF Vice Chair)

Shafi Goldwasser (chair), Julia Chuzhoy, Constantinos Daskalakis, Irit Dinur, Piotr Indyk, Ryan O’Donnell

See also

References