U.S. mathematician. He received his bachelor's and master's degrees from Columbia University. He was head of a small group that in 1957 developed the computer language FORTRAN for numerical analysis. He contributed to the development of Algol and developed a notation known as the Backus Normal, or Backus-Naur, Form for defining the syntax of a programmable language (1959). He received the Turing Award in 1977.