Prof Chen Songxi is Chair Professor and Founding Chair of the Department of Statistics and Data Science at Tsinghua University. He has been a Member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) since 2021, currently the only CAS member in the field of Statistics in China. He is the Chairman of the Chinese Society for Probability and Statistics, Vice President of the National Statistical Society of China, Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA), Fellow of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS), Elected Member of the International Statistical Institute (ISI), and Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). In 2024, Prof Chen was appointed by the Ministry of Education as the lead expert for the “101 Project” in Statistics.
Prof Chen received his BSc degree in 1981 and MSc degree in 1988, respectively from Beijing Normal University. He obtained his MSc degree in Statistics and Operations Research from Victoria University of Wellington in 1990 and a PhD degree in Statistics from the Australian National University in 1993. Prof Chen has held faculty positions at leading universities across the United States, Australia, and Singapore. To repay the motherland for its nurturing and to promote the development of statistics and data science in China, Prof Chen returned from abroad and joined Peking University as a Chair Professor in 2008. During his tenure, Prof Chen founded the interdisciplinary Center for Statistical Science at Peking University, playing a vital role in elevating PKU’s statistics to a prestigious "Double First-Class" A+ discipline. In 2024, in support of the national big data and AI strategies, Prof Chen joined Tsinghua University as a Chair Professor. He has been one of the main founders of the Department of Statistics and Data Science at Tsinghua University.
Prof Chen’s research interests focus on ultra-high dimensional big data statistical analysis, environmental statistics, nonparametric statistical methods, and related fields. He has laid the theoretical foundation for ultra-high dimensional statistical inference and empirical likelihood methods. This led to him being awarded the first prize of the Natural Science Award by the Ministry of Education of China in 2017. Prof Chen has also pioneered an in-depth interdisciplinary integration of statistics with atmospheric and environmental science, providing an evidence-based decision-making framework for national air pollution control strategies. Guided consistently by the national demands, Prof Chen has promoted Chinese statistics to the international forefront and led statistics to become the cornerstone of data science. As a highly productive scientist, Prof Chen has published more than 130 journal papers with over 5,000 SCI citations.
Prof Chen has served on the editorial boards of several leading international journals such as the Journal of the American Statistical Association, the Annals of Statistics and the Journal of Business and Economics Statistics, etc. Owing to his exceptional academic and societal contributions, Prof Chen was elected as a member of the 14th National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). During the period of Two Sessions, he proposed many helpful policies, for example, bolstering the foundational capabilities for cultivating data analysis professionals in China, and solidifying the talent base required for advancing the Digital China Initiative.
Mr Chairman, in recognition of Prof Chen’s significant contributions to science and education, I hereby request that you confer on him the title of an Honorary Fellowship.
