Professor Robert Zimmer is the head of the computing department at Goldsmiths, University of London. He studied at MIT, Cambridge University and Columbia University, where he received a PhD in Mathematics in 1985. He began his research career developing mathematical methods for hardware and software system security with applications to safety-critical systems, including nuclear reactor protection systems. He has gone on to research such varied subjects as Artificial Intelligence and Digital Art theory and practice, as well as financial mathematics and financial technologies.