Hollywood, Mathematics, and Digital Communications

"A glamorous Hollywood star, a renegade composer, and the mathematical development of spread spectrum communications".

abstract: During World War II, Hedy Lamarr, a striking Hollywood actress; together with George Antheil, a radical composer; invented and patented a secret signaling system for the remote control of torpedoes.  The ideas in this patent have since developed into one of the ingredients in modern digital wireless communications.  The unlikely biography of these two characters, along with some of the more modern developments in wireless communications will be described.