Thomas Fischer

Thomas Fischer (born 1978, Jena) is a German physicist and mathematician. He represented Germany at the 38th International Mathematical Olympiad in Mar del Plata (1997), earning a bronze medal with 22 points. He studied physics at Friedrich-Schiller-Universitaet Jena (Diploma) and stayed on to earn a doctorate in mathematics there on 6 April 2011 with a dissertation on the exact analysis of heuristics for combinatorial games, supervised by Prof. Ingo Althoefer. His doctoral work was funded by an Althoefer 3-Hirn grant (April 2008 - March 2010). He is also a published board game author, credited on the 3-Hirn-Verlag title Nat-Nuert - Entenjagd.

Notes4

• Born 1978 in Jena; represented Germany at the 1997 IMO (Mar del Plata) and earned a bronze medal with 22 points (rank 131, 71.7%), confirmed by the IMO official participant/results record.
• Doctorate (Dr. rer. nat.) in mathematics at FSU Jena, defended 2011-04-06, dissertation "Exakte Analyse von Heuristiken für kombinatorische Spiele"; classified under MSC 90 (Operations research / mathematical programming) and supervised by Ingo Althöfer.
• Won a funded 3-Hirn doctoral grant (April 2008 - March 2010) for research on analysis and programming of combinatorial games, then was a research assistant at Althöfer's chair at FSU Jena until March 2011.
• Credited as author (with 3-Hirn-Verlag) of the 2-3 player board game Nat-Nürt - Entenjagd, a 15-minute title, showing his game-theory research extends into commercial game design.
• The Althöfer 3-Hirn program, which funded his doctorate, awards grants specifically to bridge mathematics and combinatorial game programming — his career path (IMO medalist -> physics -> math PhD in games) is characteristic of that pipeline.