Martin L. Puterman

Martin Puterman won for his book Markov Decision Processes, published by John Wiley and Sons in 1994.

Puterman's work was cited as "an encyclopedic book which covers the theory and applications of Markov decision processes with discrete state space. Puterman has effected a skillful integration of this diverse literature and his book is quickly emerging as the standard reference in the field."

Puterman's research in Markov decision processes "has produced a rich theory, as well as applications in many areas, and Puterman undertook the task of systematizing that vast body of knowledge. He has succeeded admirably, explaining each concept clearly, building slowly and carefully on what has already been discussed, giving simple and intuitive proofs to the mathematical results, and illustrating the theory with numerous examples."