Vladimir Vapnik is a prominent Russian-American computer scientist known for his significant contributions to the field of machine learning and statistical learning theory. He is best known for developing the Support Vector Machine (SVM), a powerful algorithm used for classification and regression tasks in data analysis. Born on November 6, 1936, in Gorky, Russia, Vapnik has had a profound impact on artificial intelligence and data science. He co-authored the influential book "The Nature of Statistical Learning Theory," which laid the groundwork for many modern machine learning techniques and continues to be a key reference in the field.