W&L Mathematics Professor Co Authors Articles in Peer Reviewed Journals

By Brian Laubscher
July 23, 2024

Chong Wang, assistant professor of mathematics at Washington and Lee University, recently co-authored a pair of journal articles that appeared in leading peer-reviewed journals. These articles, supported in part by a pair of Summer Lenfest Grants, were co-authored with Stanley Alama and Lia Bronsard of McMaster University (Canada) and Xianyang Lu of Lakehead University (Canada).

The first article, titled "Core Shells and Double Bubbles in a Weighted Nonlocal Isoperimetric Problem," appeared in the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) Journal on Mathematical Analysis, which has an impact factor of 2.2. A journal's impact factor measures how often the average article is cited in a given year.

In the article, the authors investigate intricate and previously intractable patterns in ternary systems. "We use a generalized sharp-interface model where surface tensions across the interface can depend on the components. Our findings demonstrate how the geometry of minimizers in ternary systems evolves with varying surface tensions. We investigate global minimizers of nonlocal ternary systems using a droplet scaling regime and provide the theoretical proof," explained Wang. "This study enhances the mathematical understanding of self-organization, a phenomenon observed not only in physical systems like block copolymers - known for their remarkable ability to self-assemble into ordered structures for creating materials with desirable mechanical, optical, electrical, ionic and magnetic properties - but also in the biological contexts, such as animal coats and skin pigmentation."

The second article, "On a Quaternary Nonlocal Isoperimetric Problem," was published in the Quarterly of Applied Mathematics and studies a two-dimensional quaternary inhibitory system. This journal, published quarterly by Brown University, is distributed by the American Mathematical Society (AMS) and has an impact factor score of 1.069.

"A thorough understanding of patterns in nonlocal quaternary systems is challenging due to the model's nine parameters: six that account for various types of long-range interactions and three that determine the total area of each species," said Wang. "In this article, by considering a limiting case where three species are vanishingly small, but their interactions are correspondingly large, we distinguish two energy levels. We explore and prove the shape and spatial distribution of components in the global minimizers of these quaternary systems."

Wang joined the W&L faculty as an assistant professor in 2021. In that time, she has actively published seven research articles in top-rated peer-reviewed mathematical journals. She earned a Ph.D. from The George Washington University, and from 2018 to 2021, she conducted postdoctoral research at McMaster University and Columbia University. Her research interests encompass mathematical modeling, calculus of variations, partial differential equations, scientific computing, numerical analysis and high-performance computing.

Regarding Wang's contributions to the field of pattern formation, Robert V. Kohn, who is a renowned applied mathematician specializing in partial differential equations and calculus of variations and serves as a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, remarked, "Wang's work has changed the very shape of our field."

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