Sun-Yung Alice Chang

Sun-Yung Alice Chang (Chinese: 張聖容; pinyin: Zhāng Shèngróng, Hakka: Chông Sṳn-yùng, [t͡soŋ sɨn juŋ]; born 1948) is a Taiwanese-American mathematician specializing in aspects of mathematical analysis ranging from harmonic analysis and partial differential equations to differential geometry. She is the Eugene Higgins Professor of Mathematics at Princeton University.^[1]

Sun-Yung Alice Chang
Sun-Yung Alice Chang, 2007
Born	1948 (age 75–76) Xi'an, China
Nationality	American
Alma mater	National Taiwan University (BS) University of California, Berkeley (PhD)
Spouse	Paul C. Yang
Scientific career
Fields	Mathematics
Institutions	University of California, Los Angeles Princeton University
Doctoral advisor	Donald Sarason

Life

Chang was born in Xian, China, in 1948 and grew up in Taiwan. She received her Bachelor of Science degree in 1970 from National Taiwan University and her doctorate in 1974 from the University of California, Berkeley.^[2] At Berkeley, Chang wrote her thesis on the study of bounded analytic functions. Chang became a full professor at UCLA in 1980 before moving to Princeton in 1998.^[3]

Career and research

Chang's research interests include the study of geometric types of nonlinear partial differential equations and problems in isospectral geometry. Working with her husband Paul Yang and others, she produced contributions to differential equations in relation to geometry and topology.^[3]

She teaches at Princeton University as of 1998. Before that, she held visiting positions at University of California-Berkeley; Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, N.J.; and Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, Switzerland.^[3] She served at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology as a visiting professor in 2015.^[4]

In 2004,^[5] she was interviewed by Yu Kiang Leong for Creative Minds, Charmed Lives: Interviews at Institute for Mathematical Sciences, National University of Singapore, and she declared:

«In the mathematical community, we should leave room for people who want to do work in their own way. Mathematical research is not just a scientific approach; the nature of mathematics is sometimes close to that of art. Some people want individual character and an individual way of working things out. They should be appreciated too. There should be room for single research and collaborative research».^[6]

Chang's life was profiled in the 2017 documentary film Girls who fell in love with Math.^[7]

Service and honors

• Sloan Foundation Research Fellowship, 1979–1981^[8]
• Invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Berkeley, 1986 ^[8]
• Vice president of the American Mathematical Society, 1989-1991^[8]
• Ruth Lyttle Satter Prize in Mathematics of the American Mathematical Society, 1995 ^[8]
• Guggenheim Fellowship, 1998 ^[9]
• Plenary Speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Beijing, 2002^[10]
• Member, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 2008 ^[11]
• Honorary Degree, UPMC, 2013 ^[12]
• Fellow, National Academy of Sciences, 2009 ^[13]
• Fellow, Academia Sinica, 2012^[14]
• Fellow, American Mathematical Society, 2015^[15]
• Fellow, Association for Women in Mathematics, 2019^[16]
• MSRI Simons Professor, 2015-2016^[17]

Publications

• Chang, Sun-Yung A.; Yang, Paul C. Conformal deformation of metrics on ${\displaystyle S^{2}}$. J. Differential Geom. 27 (1988), no. 2, 259–296.
• Chang, Sun-Yung Alice; Yang, Paul C. Prescribing Gaussian curvature on ${\displaystyle S^{2}}$. Acta Math. 159 (1987), no. 3–4, 215–259.
• Chang, Sun-Yung A.; Yang, Paul C. Extremal metrics of zeta function determinants on 4-manifolds. Ann. of Math. (2) 142 (1995), no. 1, 171–212.
• Chang, Sun-Yung A.; Gursky, Matthew J.; Yang, Paul C. The scalar curvature equation on 2- and 3-spheres. Calc. Var. Partial Differential Equations 1 (1993), no. 2, 205–229.
• Chang, Sun-Yung A.; Gursky, Matthew J.; Yang, Paul C. An equation of Monge-Ampère type in conformal geometry, and four-manifolds of positive Ricci curvature. Ann. of Math. (2) 155 (2002), no. 3, 709–787.
• Chang, S.-Y. A.; Wilson, J. M.; Wolff, T. H. Some weighted norm inequalities concerning the Schrödinger operators. Comment. Math. Helv. 60 (1985), no. 2, 217–246.
• Carleson, Lennart; Chang, Sun-Yung A. On the existence of an extremal function for an inequality of J. Moser. Bull. Sci. Math. (2) 110 (1986), no. 2, 113–127.
• Chang, Sun-Yung A.; Fefferman, Robert Some recent developments in Fourier analysis and ${\displaystyle H^{p}}$-theory on product domains. Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. (N.S.) 12 (1985), no. 1, 1–43.
• Chang, Sun-Yung A.; Fefferman, Robert A continuous version of duality of ${\displaystyle H^{1}}$ with BMO on the bidisc. Ann. of Math. (2) 112 (1980), no. 1, 179–201.

References

• O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "Sun-Yung Alice Chang", MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St Andrews

1. "Sun-Yung Alice Chang". web.math.princeton.edu. Retrieved 2020-11-12.
2. Gursky, Matthew J.; Wang, Yi (March 2020). "Sun-Yung Alice Chang and Geometric Analysis" (PDF). Notices of the American Mathematical Society. 67 (3): 318. doi:10.1090/noti2037.
3. "Sun-Yung Alice Chang". Faculty Profiles. Princeton University. Retrieved 23 February 2014.
4. "List of guests". Swiss Federal Institute of Technology. Retrieved 23 February 2014.
5. Leong, Y K (Summer 2012). "An Interview with Sun-Yung Alice Chang" (PDF). Asia Pacific Mathematics Newsletter. 2: 25–29.
6. Leong, Yu Kiang (2010). Creative Minds, Charmed Lives: Interviews at Institute for Mathematical Sciences, National University of Singapore. World Scientific. ISBN 9789814317580. Retrieved 2017-09-10.
7. "Girls who fell in love with Math". Taiwan Film Institute. 31 August 2017. Retrieved 2018-02-04.
8. Oakes, Elizabeth H. (2002). International encyclopedia of women scientists. New York, NY: Facts on File. p. 58. ISBN 0816043817.
9. "Sun-Yung Alice Chang". Guggenheim Foundation. Archived from the original on 27 February 2014. Retrieved 23 February 2014.
10. "Plenary Speakers". International Congress of Mathematics. Archived from the original on 23 February 2014. Retrieved 23 February 2014.
11. "Members of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences: 1780-2013" (PDF). American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Retrieved 23 February 2014.
12. "Professor Alice Chang awarded Doctor Honoris Causa of Pierre and Marie Curie University". Princeton University. Retrieved 26 January 2019.
13. "Sun-Yung Alice Chang". National Academy of Sciences. Retrieved 23 February 2014.
14. 2012 Academicians Announced
15. 2016 Class of the Fellows of the AMS, American Mathematical Society, retrieved 2015-11-16.
16. 2019 Class of AWM Fellows, Association for Women in Mathematics, retrieved 2019-01-19
17. MSRI. "Mathematical Sciences Research Institute". www.msri.org. Retrieved 2021-06-07.

External links

• Leong, Y K (July 2012). "An Interview with Sun-Yung Alice Chang" (PDF). Asia Pacific Mathematics Newsletter. pp. 25–29.
• AWM Fellows List 2019
• Gursky, Matthew J.; Wang, Yi (March 2020). "Sun-Yung Alice Chang and Geometric Analysis" (PDF). Notices of the American Mathematical Society. 67 (3): 318–326. doi:10.1090/noti2037.