Claude Shannon, in full Claude Elwood Shannon, (born April 30, 1916, Petoskey, Michigan, U.S.—died February 24, 2001, Medford, Massachusetts), American mathematician and electrical engineer who laid the theoretical foundations for digital circuits and information theory, a mathematical communication model.

After graduating from the University of Michigan in 1936 with bachelor’s degrees in mathematics and electrical engineering, Shannon obtained a research assistant’s position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). There, among other duties, he worked with the noted researcher Vannevar Bush, helping to set up differential equations on Bush’s differential analyzer. A summer internship at American Telephone and Telegraph’s Bell Laboratories in New York City in 1937 inspired much of Shannon’s subsequent research interests. In 1940 he earned both a master’s degree in electrical engineering and a Ph.D. in mathematics from MIT. He joined the mathematics department at Bell Labs in 1941, where he first contributed to work on antiaircraft missile control systems. He remained affiliated with Bell Labs until 1972. Shannon became a visiting professor at MIT in 1956, a permanent member of the faculty in 1958, and professor emeritus in 1978.