Hongkai Zhao

Professor Hongkai Zhao is a Chancellor’s Professor and Chair of the Mathematics Department at the University of California, Irvine (UCI), with a joint appointment in Computer Science. He holds a B.S. from Peking University, M.S. from USC, and Ph.D. from UCLA, all in Mathematics. His research focuses on computational and applied mathematics, including moving interface problems, inverse problems, imaging, and Hamilton-Jacobi equations. He is renowned for developing the Fast Sweeping Method (FSM) for solving hyperbolic PDEs efficiently.

Education: B.S. (Peking University, 1990), M.S. (USC, 1992), Ph.D. (UCLA, 1996). Employment: UCI faculty since 1999, Szego Assistant Professor at Stanford (1996–1999).

Research interests span computational fluid dynamics (moving interfaces), inverse problems (tomography, wave propagation), and imaging (medical imaging, computer vision). Key contributions include numerical methods for surfactant-laden drops, fast algorithms for Hamilton-Jacobi equations, and 4D cone-beam CT reconstruction.

Awards include the Feng Kang Prize (2007), Sloan Fellowship (2002–2004), and Chancellor’s Professorship (2016–present). He has authored over 100 publications on numerical methods, inverse problems, and PDEs.

Lab affiliations: Active in interdisciplinary research at UCI, leading projects in computational mathematics and imaging science. Current work includes high-frequency wave propagation, multi-scale modeling, and geometric data analysis.