“Whenever we had to go to the chancellor to make some special request, we always took Chern along, and it always worked,” says Berkeley mathematician Rob Kirby. Abraham Pais wrote about Chern in his book Subtle is the Lord. In mathematics, the Chern–Simons forms are certain secondary characteristic classes. In the summer of 1934, Chern graduated from Tsinghua with a master's degree, the first ever master's degree in mathematics issued in China.[12]. Two of Chern's most important contributions that have reshaped the fields of geometry and topology include, In 2007, Chern's disciple and IAS director Phillip Griffiths edited Inspired by S. S. Chern: A Memorial Volume in Honor of A Great Mathematician (World Scientific Press). He graduated from Xiushui Middle School (秀水中學) and subsequently moved to Tianjin in 1922 to accompany his father. Nobel Prize winner and former student CN Yang has said[23], “Chern and I and many others felt that we have the responsibility to try to create more understanding between the American people and the Chinese people, and... all of us shared the desire to promote more exchanges.”, In 1999, Chern moved from Berkeley back to Tianjin, China permanently until his death. [13] At Nankai, Chern's mentor was mathematician Jiang Lifu, and Chern was also heavily influenced by the physicist Rao Yutai, considered to be one of the founding fathers of modern Chinese informatics. 1986, Corresponding Member, Academia Peloritana, Messina, Sicily; Shiing Shen Chern, Topics in Differential Geometry, The Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton 1951, Shiing Shen Chern, Differential Manifolds, University of Chicago 1953, Shiing Shen Chern, Complex Manifolds, University of Chicago, 1956, Shiing Shen Chern: Complex manifolds Without Potential Theory, Springer-Verlag, New York 1979, Shiing Shen Chern, Minimal Sumanifolds in a Riemannian Manifold, University of Kansas 1968. When you saw him on the street, when a certain issue would come up, he would pull out some old envelope and write something and give you the answer. But he has said that given China's size, it naturally has a large talent pool of budding mathematicians. Chern–Simons theory arising from a 1974 paper written jointly with Jim Simons; and also gauge theory, Chern–Simons form, Chern-Simons field theory.
[14], In 1934, Chern received a scholarship to study in the United States at Princeton and Harvard, but at the time he wanted to study geometry and Europe was the center for the maths and sciences. [17][2] Coincidentally, Ernest Preston Lane, former Chair at UChicago Department of Mathematics, was the doctoral advisor of Chern's undergraduate mentor at Tsinghua—Sun Guangyuan. Simons talks about Chern in his TED talk.[40]. [5] Chern liked to play contract bridge, Go (game) and had an interest in Chinese philosophy.[23]. May Chu described her father as an easygoing parent.
In 1926, after spending four years in Tianjin, Chern graduated from Fulun High School (扶輪中學).[12]. He was treated as a rock star and cultural icon in China. [7] It was compiled with the help of his friends including Alan Weinstein, Chuu-Lian Terng, Calvin C. Moore, Marty Shen, Robert Bryant, Robert Uomini, Robert Osserman, Hung-Hsi Wu, Rob Kirby, CN Yang, Paul Chu, Udo Simon, Phillip Griffiths, etc.[23]. CS theory now has great importance in knot theory and modern string theory and condensed matter physics research, including Topological phases of matter and Topological quantum field theory . Uomini and his wife set up the Robert G. Uomini and Louise B. Bidwell Foundation to support an extended visit of an outstanding mathematician to the U.C. [11][5][2] This period at the IAS was a turning point in career, having a major impact on mathematics, while fundamentally altering the course of differential geometry and algebraic geometry. A polyglot, he spoke German, French, English, Wu and Mandarin Chinese. He has also received a more homegrown honor, the dream-turned-reality of an appreciative student of 30 years ago, who grew up in the Bay Area.
I think that he, more than anyone, was the founder of one of the central areas of modern mathematics.”, His work extended over all the classic fields of differential geometry as well as more modern ones including general relativity, invariant theory, characteristic classes, cohomology theory, Morse theory, Fiber bundles, Sheaf theory, Cartan's theory of differential forms, etc. At the same time, Chern was Chen-Ning Yang's teacher of undergraduate maths at Tsinghua.
[17], Between 1943-1964 he was invited back to the IAS on several occasions. Chern was tempted by what he called the "organizational beauty" of Artin's algebra, but in the end, he decided to go to France in September 1936. Dozens of other biographies have been written on Chern. In 1982, while on sabbatical at the New York University Courant Institute, he visited Stony Brook to see his friends and former students CN Yang and Simons. [5], In July 1943, Chern went to the United States, and worked at the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) in Princeton on characteristic classes in differential geometry. [20] Shing-Tung Yau was one of his PhD students during this period, and he later won the Fields Medal. (Doctor of Science, which is equivalent to PhD) degree in February, 1936. 1986), his alma mater Hamburg (D.Sc. Chern-Gauss-Bonnet Theorem On his 60th birthday he wrote a love letter re-affirming his gratitude towards his wife and celebrating their 'beautiful long happy marriage':[38]. The Shanghai Communiqué was issued by the United States and the People's Republic of China on February 27, 1972. There was something about him that people just listened to him, and usually did things his way.”[7], In 1979 a Chern Symposium offered him a honorary song in tribute:[2]. The relation to 11d Chern-Simons theory is made manifest in Dmitriy Belov, Greg Moore, Type II Actions from 11-Dimensional Chern-Simons Theories (arXiv:hep-th/0611020) Review is in Richard Szabo, section 3.6 and 4.6 of Quantization of Higher Abelian Gauge [11] According to Taking the Long View: The Life of Shiing-shen Chern (2011):[7]. In 1964, Chern was a vice-president of American Mathematical Society (AMS). He used the moving frame method with success only matched by its inventor; he preferred in complex manifold theory to stay with the geometry, rather than follow the potential theory. During this period of time, Chern visited China 25 times, of which 14 were to his home province Zhejiang.
By the time Chern started returning to China regularly during the 1980s, he had become a celebrity; every school child knew his name, and TV cameras documented his every move whenever he ventured forth from the institute he established at Nankai University. [5], It was at this time that he had to choose between the career of algebra in Germany under Emil Artin and the career of geometry in France under Élie-Joseph Cartan. It permitted him to explore in depth new mathematical territory where others could not enter. Realizing that a citizenship was necessary, I applied for it. The relationship between these two nations started to normalize, and American citizens were allowed to visit China. [7], He has said that back then the main obstruent to the growth of math in China is the low pay, which is important considering that after the cultural revolution many families were impoverished. Information for Physics 695, Fall 2013. Chern has written[5]. He was made an Honorary member of the Indian Mathematical Society in 1950. In the summer of 1937, Chern accepted the invitation of Tsinghua University and returned to China. Advanced Topics in Mathematical Physics, Fall 2010. will be offered instead. In 1950 he was invited by the International Congress of Mathematicians in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Chern's surname is a common Chinese surname which is now usually spelled Chen. 1982), Stony Brook University (D.Sc. As a consequence I became a US citizen about a month before my election to academy membership. [13] Co-funded by Tsinghua and the Chinese Foundation of Culture and Education, Chern went to continue his study in mathematics in Germany with a scholarship. [16], He spent one year at the Sorbonne in Paris. Chern has 43 students, including Fields medalist Shing-Tung Yau, Nobel Prize winner Chen-Ning Yang; and over 1000 descendants. Every year at Dec. 3rd, Ningyuan is open for visitors for memorial of him. In 1954 he published his own treatment of the pseudogroup problem that is in effect the touchstone of Cartan's geometric theory. In the last years of his life, he advocated the study of Finsler geometry, writing several books and articles on the subject. During WW2, the US did not have much of a scene in geometry (which is why he chose to study in Germany). [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] In memory of Shiing-Shen Chern, the International Mathematical Union established the Chern Medal in 2010 to recognize "an individual whose accomplishments warrant the highest level of recognition for outstanding achievements in the field of mathematics". [11] On Chern, Weil wrote:[18]. On his wife he writes (also see Selected Papers):[2]. He immediately impressed Hermann Weyl and Oswald Veblen.
I had to work very hard.
1971) and Nankai (honorary doctorate, 1985), etc.
His work included areas currently-fashionable, perennial, foundational, and nascent:[2][25]. In English, Chern pronounced his name "Churn" (/tʃɜːrn/), and this pronunciation is now universally accepted among English-speaking mathematicians and physicists. I am inclined to think that among the people who have stayed at the Institute, I was one who has profited the most, but the other people may think the same way.”.
NKIM was renamed the Chern Institute of Mathematics in 2004 after Chern's death. Paul added that he often saw what was best for you before you realized it.[23]. He would often eat lunch and chat in German with fellow colleague Erich Kähler. The unusual spelling "Chern" is a transliteration in the old Gwoyeu Romatzyh (GR) romanization for Mandarin Chinese used in the early twentieth-century China. In contrast the bulk partition function of AdS(3) string theory is the modular-invariant partition function of the dual CFT on the boundary.
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