Yum-Tong Siu

In this Chinese name, the family name is Siu.

Yum-Tong Siu (Chinese: 蕭蔭堂; born May 6, 1943) is a Chinese mathematician. He is the William Elwood Byerly Professor of Mathematics at Harvard University.

Yum-Tong Siu
Yum-Tong Siu in 2000
Born	(1943-05-06) May 6, 1943 Guangzhou, China
Alma mater	University of Hong Kong (BA) University of Minnesota (MA) Princeton University (PhD)
Scientific career
Fields	Complex analysis
Institutions	Harvard University
Doctoral advisor	Robert C. Gunning
Doctoral students	Jun-Muk Hwang, Ngaiming Mok
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese	蕭蔭堂
Simplified Chinese	萧荫堂
Hanyu Pinyin	Xiāo Yìntáng
Yale Romanization	Sīu Yamtòhng
Jyutping	Siu1 Jam3-tong4

Siu is a prominent figure in the study of functions of several complex variables. His research interests involve the intersection of complex variables, differential geometry, and algebraic geometry. He has resolved various conjectures by applying estimates of the complex Neumann problem and the theory of multiplier ideal sheaves to algebraic geometry.

Education and career

Siu obtained his B.A. in mathematics from the University of Hong Kong in 1963, his M.A. from the University of Minnesota, and his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 1966. Siu completed his doctoral dissertation, titled "Coherent Noether-Lasker decomposition of subsheaves and sheaf cohomology", under the supervision of Robert C. Gunning. Before joining Harvard, he taught at Purdue University, the University of Notre Dame, Yale, and Stanford. In 1982 he joined Harvard as a Professor, of Mathematics. He previously served as the Chairman of the Harvard Math Department.

In 2006, Siu published a proof of the finite generation of the pluricanonical ring.

Awards, honors and professional memberships

In 1993, Siu received the Stefan Bergman Prize of the American Mathematical Society. He has holds honorary doctorates from the University of Hong Kong, University of Bochum, Germany, and University of Macau. He is a Corresponding Member of the Goettingen Academy of Sciences (elected 1993); a Foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (elected 2004); and a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (elected 1998), the National Academy of Sciences (elected 2002), and Academia Sinica, Taiwan (elected 2004). He has been an invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Helsinki (1978), Warsaw (1983) and Beijing (2002).

Currently, Siu is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Clay Mathematics Institute (since 2003); the Advisory Committee for the Shaw Prize In Mathematical Sciences (since 2010); the Advisory Committee for the Millennium Prize Problems under the sponsorship of the Clay Mathematics Institute; the Scientific Advisory Board for the Institute for Mathematics Sciences, National University of Singapore (since 2009) and the Institute of Advanced Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (since 2006).

See also

• Göttingen Academy of Sciences
• Siu's semicontinuity theorem
• List of graduates of University of Hong Kong
• Math 55

External links

• Yum-Tong Siu at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
• In 2003 and 2004, the Asian Journal of Mathematics dedicated several issues to Siu:
  • Vol. 7 #4
  • Vol. 8 #1 and 2
• english.cas.cn