Xia named Pancoe Professor in Mathematics

Zhihong Jeff Xia, professor of mathematics, has been named the Arthur and Gladys Pancoe Professor in Mathematics.

Xia has made important contributions to mathematics research. His areas of interest are dynamical systems, Hamiltonian dynamics and celestial mechanics, which is the study of stability and chaotic properties of various physical and mechanical systems.

He solved the so-called Painleve problem, which was proposed by French Prime Minister and mathematician Paul Painleve in 1897. Recently, Xia also solved the "gap problem" in Arnold diffusion, which relates to gravitational systems and the n-body problem. The "gap problem" had been the main difficulty in understanding instability problems for 30 years. Xia’s solution should generate significant research and applications for many years to come.

Xia is the recipient of many honors and awards. The National Science Foundation honored him with the National Young Investigator Award. He is the beneficiary of the first Blumenthal Award for the Advancement of Mathematics from the American Mathematical Society and the Best Paper Award from the Sigma Xi Scientific Research Foundation. Xia also received the Fifth Monroe Martin Prize for Applied Mathematics from the University of Maryland. He is a Fellow for the Alfred Sloan Foundation and an Institute Fellow for the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Xia has an active international speaking schedule. At the invitation of one of the world’s leading mathematicians, Stephen Smale, Xia served as a visiting professor at the City University of Hong Kong during the 1999-2000 school year. In 1998, Xia spoke at the International Congress of Mathematics in Berlin, considered to be one of the highest honors in the field.

Xia is an editor of several professional journals including "Celestial Mechanics and Dynamical Astronomy," "Journal of Discrete and Continuous Dynamical Systems," "Asian Journal of Mathematics," "Communications in Contemporary Mathematics" and "Acta Mathematica Sinica."

He is a member of the Editorial Board of Electronic Research Announcements the American Mathematical Society. Prior to joining the Northwestern faculty in 1994, Xia was an associate professor at Georgia Tech and an assistant professor at Harvard University.