Shiing-Shen Chern, a Distinguished Visiting  Professor Emeritus at the University of Houston

Internationally acclaimed mathematician Shiing-Shen Chern, a Distinguished Visiting Professor Emeritus at the University of Houston, has died in Tianjin, China. He was 93.

Chern passed away Dec. 3, according to press reports, on the campus of Nankai University, where he served as director of its mathematics center. One source cited heart failure as the apparent cause of death.

He was considered the greatest differential geometer of the 20th century, and his creation - Chern Classes - is considered a fundamental principle of mathematical physics.

Born in 1911, Chern graduated from Nankai University in 1930. After further study at Beijing’s Tsinghua University and in Europe, Chern taught during World War II both in China and at the Institute for Advanced Study in the United States.

Chern eventually went to the University of Chicago and became a naturalized U.S. citizen. In 1960, he moved to the University of California at Berkeley, where a mathematics chair was recently endowed in his name by an admiring undergraduate student who won the lottery. In 1980, he became founding director of the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (MSRI).

His association with the University of Houston’s department of mathematics involved yearly visits and lectures that began in 1988. From 1992 to 2000, he served as an editor of the Houston Journal of Mathematics (published by UH’s math department). Two years ago, an entire issue of HJM was dedicated to Chern.

Chern was the father-in-law of UH Professor of Physics Paul Chu, who holds the TLL Temple Chair of Science and is Founding Director of the Texas Center for Superconductivity. Chu is also President of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Chu is married to Chern’s daughter, May, herself a mathematician.

“He was happy and healthy,” Chu said. “This came suddenly for all of us who loved and admired him. He lived a full life, and one cannot ask for more than that. But he still had many things he wanted to complete. This is a great loss.”

An official memorial service honoring Chern is planned by the Chinese government Dec. 12 at Nankai University.

The inaugural Shaw Prize in Mathematics (with a $1 million award) was given to Chern in September to recognize his singular contributions to, and influence on, the world of mathematics. He donated the prize to several institutes for the development of mathematics and physics.

Eric Gerber
egerber@uh.edu