Sun-Yung Alice Chang, working with Paul Yang, Tom Branson, and Matt Gursky, has produced what the American Mathematical Society has termed "deep contributions" to the study of partial differential equations in relation to geometry and topology.

Sun-Yung Alice Chang was born in Ci-an, China, on March 24, 1948, and studied for her bachelor's degree at the National University of Taiwan, which she received in 1970. Chang emigrated to the United States for graduate work and a series of teaching jobs. In 1974, Chang earned her Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley. She has served as assistant professor at SUNY-Buffalo, the University of California at Los Angeles, and the University of Maryland. Chang returned to UCLA as an associate professor, and she became a full professor in 1980. Her most visible performance was as a speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians, held in Berkeley in 1986.

In 1995, Chang was awarded the...