Obituary for Prof. Dr. Hans-Peter Scheffler

Hans-Peter Scheffler was born on April 4, 1965, in Siegen, where he also earned his degree in mathematics in 1990. He then spent more than a decade at the University of Dortmund, completing his doctorate in 1992 under Prof. Hazod and his habilitation in 1998. After holding temporary professorships at the University of Dortmund and the University of Siegen, he was appointed to the University of Nevada, Reno (USA) in 2004, where he spent two years. In 2006, he returned to his hometown of Siegen to take up a professorship in stochastics. Since then, his workplace had been the Emmy Noether Campus of the University of Siegen — in the very building of the former Jung-Stilling Hospital where he had been born. He leaves behind his wife and a daughter, to whom we extend our deepest sympathy.

We bid farewell to an internationally leading expert in probability theory, who leaves behind an extensive body of work on multivariate limit theorems and operator-self-similar stochastic processes and random fields. His exceptionally fruitful collaboration with Mark Meerschaert (University of Nevada, later Michigan State University) began during his doctoral studies. This partnership resulted in numerous joint publications in scientific journals as well as the highly acclaimed monograph Limit Distributions for Sums of Independent Random Vectors. The two were connected not only by a long-standing academic partnership, in which they complemented each other almost ideally, but also by a deep personal friendship.

With his extraordinary commitment to teaching, research, and academic self-governance, Hans-Peter Scheffler rendered lasting service to the University of Siegen. The Department of Mathematics mourns the loss of a world-renowned researcher and beloved lecturer, while the staff mourn the loss of a valued and witty colleague who was always something special.

In Hans-Peter Scheffler, we have lost a long-standing friend and academic companion who enriched us not only with his intellectual brilliance, but also with his unconventional nature, his humor, and his warmth. We will miss his cheerful "Huhu!" in the morning, his tongue-in-cheek remarks such as "The semester is dragging on!" even during the very first week of classes. We will remember him fondly — and perhaps stir our coffee with our finger in his memory. And if you wish to commemorate him in a less painful way, feel free to play The Unforgiven by Metallica in his honor.

Peter Kern and Alfred Müller