Leading Mathematician Envisions a "Harvard of Hong Kong"

April 17, 2007

Shing-Tung Yau, 57, is putting his time and other people's money towards trying to close the mathematical gap between China and the United States. But it's not because the U.S. lags behind China in the arena of mathematics. Rather, it's that mathematicians in China hve yet to catch up to their Western counterparts, he claims.

"Most Chinese," he said in a recent article in Forbes magazine, "still use technology from America. I want them to create their own research so they don't rely on others and don't copy."

Yau was most recently in the news for allegedly claiming to have played a significant role in proving the Poincare conjecture, as recounted in a controversial New Yorker article last summer.

Nonetheless, Yau — a 1982 Fields medalist, 1985 MacArthur fellow, and 1997 National Medal of Science awardee — has continued to use his contacts to seek out money and support to bring Chinese mathematics up to world-class standards.

He's garnered enough funds from around the world to open three mathematical centers, including one in Hong Kong that awards doctorates.

It took Harvard, Yau noted, "a few hundred years to be built." He hoped that it wouldn't take as long for his Hong Kong institute to achieve such heights.

Source: Forbes