Autobiography And Study Plan

By Nien Chia-Hsing, Sometime 1989

I was born in Taipei Taiwan on August 7, 1963. My father is a janitor of a building in our neighborhood, and my mother is a housewife, who takes care all the affairs of our family. I have two brothers and two sisters, and we lead a happy and harmonious life.

I entered school at the age of six. I spent 6 years in primary school, 3 years in junior high school and another 3 years in senior high school. When I was 13 or so, my elder brother, who also took mathematics as his undergraduate major, finished his military service and told me a series of stories about great mathematicians such as C. F. Gauss, G. H. Hardy, S. Ramanujan and L. Euler. He also taught me some fundamental concepts of number theory. Under his guidance, I realized that the phenomena in the natural world can always be explained by some terse and beautiful mathematical formulas. All of these made me feel strong interest in mathematics. During these periods, my mathematics grades were always among the best. So I decided to learn as many profound mathematical theories as I could.

In 1981, after my graduation from senior high school, I took the Joint College Entrance Examination. Fortunately, I gained the admission to the Department of Applied Mathematics of National Chiao Tung University.

In my college days, I devoted most of my time to the following subjects: Advance Calculus, Set Theory, Modern Algebra, Complex Analysis, Numerical Analysis, Discrete Mathematics, Real Analysis and Assembly Theory, and always got grades A. I learn many important and subtle theorems from these courses and my undergraduate study was fruitful. After taking the degree of Bachelor of Science in June, 1985, I went to the two-year military service.

Now I am working as an editor for the CHIU CHANG MATH MAGAZINE. My boss, Mr. Wen-Hsien Sun, is an enthusiast for mathematics education in our country. So he published the magazine by himself for the purpose of promoting the mathematical level in the country. The contents of this magazine include articles on mathematical thoughts, mathematics education, mathematics history, applied mathematics and so on. I like this job very much, since it matches my interest. At the same time, I have the opportunities to broaden my horizen of math knowledge and to review some fundamental subjects such as Analytic Geometry and Calculus.

In my future field of study, I will concentrate on Topology, Differential Geomtry, Functional Analysis, Foundations of mathematics, Number Theory and other branches of pure mathematics, so that I can integrate my math knowledge into a whole system.

I am really interested in the mathematical development in my country. I hope I can help my fellow countrymen with the research of mathematics. That is why after completing the study, I will return to Taiwan and seek a teaching position.