Hu Hesheng (; born 20 June 1928) is a Chinese

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History On ...

. She served as vice-president of

Chinese Mathematical Society The Chinese Mathematical Society (CMS, ) is an academic organization for Chinese mathematicians, with the official websitwww.cms.org.cn It is a member of China Association of Science and Technology. History The Chinese Mathematical Society (CMS) w ...

, president of the Shanghai Mathematical Society, and is an academician of

Chinese Academy of Science The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS); ), known by Academia Sinica in English until the 1980s, is the national academy of the People's Republic of China for natural sciences. It has historical origins in the Academia Sinica during the Republic ...

. She held the

Noether Lecture The Noether Lecture is a distinguished lecture series that honors women "who have made fundamental and sustained contributions to the mathematical sciences". The Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) established the annual lectures in 1980 as t ...

in 2002.

Education and career

Born in

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flow ...

, Hu studied mathematics at

National Chiao Tung University National Chiao Tung University (NCTU; ) was a public research university located in Hsinchu, Taiwan. Established in 1896 as Nanyang Public School by an imperial edict of the Guangxu Emperor, it was one of China's leading universities. After th ...

(now

Shanghai Jiaotong University Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU; ) is a public research university in Shanghai, China. The university is funded by the Ministry of Education of China. The university was established on April 8, 1896 as Nanyang Public School (南洋� ...

) and Great China University. She received her master's degree in mathematics from

Zhejiang University Zhejiang University, abbreviated as ZJU or Zheda and formerly romanized as Chekiang University, is a national public research university based in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China. It is a member of the prestigious C9 League and is selected into the na ...

in 1952, under the supervision of

Su Buqing Su Buqing, also spelled Su Buchin (; September 23, 1902 – March 17, 2003), was a Chinese mathematician, educator and poet. He was the founder of differential geometry in China, and served as president of Fudan University and honorary chairman ...

. During 1952-1956, she was a researcher at the Institute of Mathematics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. 1956, she began working as a lecturer at

Fudan University Fudan University () is a national public research university in Shanghai, China. Fudan is a member of the C9 League, Project 985, Project 211, and the Double First Class University identified by the Ministry of Education of China. It is als ...

in Shanghai, later becoming an

associate professor Associate professor is an academic title with two principal meanings: in the North American system and that of the ''Commonwealth system''. Overview In the ''North American system'', used in the United States and many other countries, it is a ...

and eventually achieving full-time professorship.

Service and recognition

Hu served as vice president of the Chinese Mathematical Society and president of the Shanghai Mathematical Society. In 2002, she was chosen as the Emmy Noether Lecturer for that year's

International Congress of Mathematicians The International Congress of Mathematicians (ICM) is the largest conference for the topic of mathematics. It meets once every four years, hosted by the International Mathematical Union (IMU). The Fields Medals, the Nevanlinna Prize (to be rename ...

in Beijing, China. She was elected as an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1991 and as an academician of the Third World Academy of Science in 2003.

Research

Her main academic interests are

differential geometry Differential geometry is a mathematical discipline that studies the geometry of smooth shapes and smooth spaces, otherwise known as smooth manifolds. It uses the techniques of differential calculus, integral calculus, linear algebra and multili ...

and

mathematical physics Mathematical physics refers to the development of mathematics, mathematical methods for application to problems in physics. The ''Journal of Mathematical Physics'' defines the field as "the application of mathematics to problems in physics and t ...

. She led a research group at Fudan University during the 1980s and 1990s.

Personal

Hu's husband was

Gu Chaohao Gu Chaohao (; May 15, 1926 – June 24, 2012) was a Chinese mathematician. He graduated from National Chekiang University (Zhejiang University) in 1948, and received a doctorate in physics and mathematical science from Moscow University in 1959. ...

, also a mathematician, who served as the president of

University of Science and Technology of China A university () is an educational institution, institution of higher education, higher (or Tertiary education, tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. Universities ty ...

. They were married until his death in 2012.

References

External links

The Noether Lecturers

* ttp://www.hlhl.org.cn/english/showsub.asp?id=501 Hu Hesheng's profile in HLHL website
Introduction from Fudan University

(Chinese) {{DEFAULTSORT:Hu, Hesheng 1928 births Living people 20th-century women mathematicians 21st-century women mathematicians Chinese women mathematicians East China Normal University alumni Educators from Shanghai Fudan University faculty Mathematicians from Shanghai Members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Shanghai Jiao Tong University alumni Zhejiang University alumni