PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Its'Hak Dinstein

Also known as Yitzhak Dinstein, Itshak Dinstein

Its'hak Dinstein is an image-analysis researcher whose 1973 paper with Robert Haralick described easily computable textural features and tested them on photomicrographs, aerial photographs and satellite imagery. He earned a doctorate at the University of Kansas in 1974 with the dissertation 'Clustering Analysis and Its Application to Multi-Image Data', advised by Haralick. In 1993, he and Gady Agam published a method for separating touching objects in automatic chromosome classification. At Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, he advised students who finished in 1996, 1999 and 2000, and from 2014 to 2016 he coauthored papers on historical-document images, among them a keyword-retrieval method tested on Hebrew documents from the Cairo Genizah collection. He is an Emeritus Full Professor in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.

Badges

Timeline

  1. 1973

    Textural features for image classification

    In 1973, he coauthors 'Textural Features for Image Classification' with Robert Haralick and K. Shanmugam in IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man and Cybernetics. The paper describes easily computable textural features and tests them on photomicrographs of sandstones, aerial photographs and satellite imagery, with test accuracy of 89, 82 and 83 percent.

  2. 1974

    A Kansas doctorate under Haralick

    In 1974, he receives a Ph.D. from the University of Kansas with the dissertation 'Clustering Analysis and Its Application to Multi-Image Data'. His advisor is Robert Martin Haralick.

  3. 1993

    Separating touching chromosomes

    In 1993, he and Gady Agam publish a method for separating touching objects, applied to automatic chromosome classification, at the Vision Geometry II conference in Boston. The method uses low-level knowledge about the objects and extracted information alone, and does not depend on the existence of a separating path.

  4. 1996–2000

    Advising three Ben-Gurion students

    He advises three students who finish at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev: Boaz Lerner in 1996, Gady Adam in 1999 and Boaz Cohen in 2000.

  5. 2014–2016

    Reading degraded historical manuscripts

    In 2014, he coauthors with Irina Rabaev, Jihad El-Sana and Klara Kedem a segmentation-free method for retrieving keywords from degraded historical documents, tested on Hebrew document images from the Cairo Genizah collection. In 2016, he coauthors 'Evolution maps and applications' in PeerJ Computer Science, which maps how connected components change along the gray-scale threshold to improve the binarization of degraded documents.

  6. As of October 2026

    Emeritus professor at Ben-Gurion

    He is an Emeritus Full Professor in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, whose research portal lists his research output from 1970 to 2016.

Career

  1. NowBen-Gurion University of the NegevEmeritus Full Professor

Education

  1. 1974University of KansasPh.D.

From the biography.

  1. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other universityIncludes Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology trained or employed 44 of the 187 AI major-prize winners, more than any other university. We compare doctorate and 5+ year employment links, career timing and current workplaces for 187 major-prize and 1,111 best-paper winners.
  2. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. We estimate where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led. Massachusetts Institute of Technology leads with 467 former students, including 291 recorded doctorates.
  3. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974Includes Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. We estimate where the people shaping AI worked when their most-cited papers appeared: the company share was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974, and Google led all organizations in 2020–2024.
  4. Google had the most people shaping AI every year from 2014 to 2025Our estimates of which organizations employed the most people shaping AI each year from 1955 to 2025, tracing the shift from university labs to companies.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Its'Hak Dinstein yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. [HSD+73] Texture features for image classification cs.umb.edu. Checked 21 October 2026.
  2. Textural Features for Image Classification - Ben-Gurion University Research Portal cris.bgu.ac.il. Checked 21 October 2026.
  3. Its'hak Dinstein - The Mathematics Genealogy Project mathgenealogy.org. Checked 21 October 2026.
  4. Geometric separation of touching objects applied to automatic chromosome classification - Ben-Gurion University Research Portal cris.bgu.ac.il. Checked 21 October 2026.
  5. Segmentation-free keyword retrieval in historical document images - Ben-Gurion University Research Portal cris.bgu.ac.il. Checked 21 October 2026.
  6. Evolution maps and applications - Ben-Gurion University Research Portal cris.bgu.ac.il. Checked 21 October 2026.
  7. Yitzhak Dinstein - Ben-Gurion University Research Portal cris.bgu.ac.il. Checked 21 October 2026.