Ren Wins 2025 Feng Kang Prize for Contributions to Computational Mathematics

Kui Ren, Professor of Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics at Columbia Engineering, is the recipient of the 2025 Feng Kang Prize, the most prestigious honor in computational mathematics awarded in China.

Presented biennially by the Institute of Computational Mathematics and Scientific and Engineering Computing of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Feng Kang Prize recognizes exceptional achievements by Chinese mathematicians in the broad field of scientific computing. The prize is named after Feng Kang, a pioneering figure in computational mathematics.

Prof. Ren was recognized for his "contributions in computational and theoretical understanding of inverse problems for PDEs and mathematical imaging." The award includes a monetary prize of 20,000 Chinese Yuan and will be presented during the General Assembly of the China Society for Computational Mathematics, held in Changsha from August 17-21, 2025.

Prof. Ren received his B.S. from Nanjing University in China and his Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics from the APAM Department at Columbia University in May 2006. He moved to the University of Chicago as a L.E. Dickson Instructor in 2007 and, in 2008, he joined the faculty at the University of Texas at Austin in the Department of Mathematics and the Oden Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences where he became a tenured professor. Prof. Ren returned to Columbia Engineering in 2018 and joined the Applied Mathematics faculty in the APAM Department. He is also now a member of the Columbia Data Science Institute, the Initiative for Computational Science and Engineering, and the Artificial Intelligence@Columbia.

Prof. Ren's research involves several aspects of applied and computational mathematics. His recent work includes theoretical and numerical analysis of inverse problems related to partial differential equations with applications in biomedical imaging; mathematical modeling and computation of the propagation of high-frequency acoustic/electromagnetic waves in random media; numerical and mathematical studies of random graphs and networks; as well as numerical algorithms for kinetic modeling of electrostatics and charge transport in semiconductor devices.

Congratulations to Prof. Ren on this well-deserved recognition of his outstanding contributions to the field of computational mathematics. As both an alumnus and a faculty member of Columbia University, his international recognition highlights the global impact of Columbia's academic community and its tradition of excellence in research and scholarship.