Allan Pearson

Dr. Allan Pearson, of Mansfield, Mass.; Oct. 17. Professor emeritus of engineering. He received both his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Minnesota before completing his PhD in mechanical engineering at Columbia University. He joined the Brown faculty in September of 1963 and was promoted to associate professor in 1966 and full professor in 1970. His work was highly mathematical in nature, applied to practical problems in control, and used computational methods to prove the concepts. His research involved collaboration and interaction with the NASA/Electronics research center, the U.S. Army Natick Labs, and the Air Force Aerospace Research Laboratory, and resulted in the publication of more than 100 papers and over 90 invited talks. He was a member of numerous professional organizations and served on several University-related committees. Aside from research, he taught several courses at Brown, including two of the foundational courses in engineering for first-year students. In addition, he supervised 19 master’s and 15 doctoral theses. He is survived by two sons, including Dan Pearson ’91.