Prof. Shing Tung YAU

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Professor Yau Shing-tung is one of the most influential contemporary Mathematicians. He is William Casper Graustein Professor of Mathematics at Harvard University and also serves as Distinguished Visiting Professor-at-Large and Director of The Institute of Mathematical Sciences (IMS) at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), paying visits to CUHK regularly. In 1969, he graduated from the Department of Mathematics, Chung Chi College, the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and was then admitted to the University of California, Berkeley where he completed his PhD degree two years later under the supervision of Prof. Chern Shiing-shen. He taught at the Institute for Advanced Study of Princeton, Stanford University, Stony Brook University, and University of California, San Diego. He has been a faculty member at Harvard since 1987. Professor Yau initiated the development of Mathematics in China. He led a number of research institutes in China, including Hong Kong where he grew up, for research and nurturing young mathematicians. He strived for research in Mathematics for 40 years and has received numerous awards and honours. At his age of 33, he was granted the Fields Medal, which was regarded as the Nobel Prize in Mathematics. He continued to be recognized via the Veblen Prize in Geometry (1981), the MacArthur Fellowship (1985), the Crafoord Prize (1994) and the US National Medal of Science (1997). In 2010, Professor Yau received the Wolf Prize in Mathematics in recognition of his lifetime contribution to geometric analysis, and his enormous impact on many areas of geometry and physics.