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Rachel C. Hale Professor in the Sciences and Mathematics Leslie Cheng ’91 focuses her research on a range of topics—Fourier analysis, oscillatory integrals, singular integrals, and Hardy spaces.

Oops!

After an unsuccessful attempt at calculus in high school, Cheng’s guidance counselor told her parents, “that I’d be successful in life as long as I stayed away from math.” 

In Harmony 

In the past two centuries, harmonic analysis has become a vast subject with applications in areas as diverse as signal processing, quantum mechanics, and neuroscience.

Catching Waves  

Harmonic analysis is the branch of mathematics that studies the representation of signals or functions as the superposition of basic waves.

Kismet

At �����������, she expected to major in French or English, but an encounter with now Professor Emeritus of Mathematics Rhonda Hughes changed her academic path.

Too Good to be True

“I went to her calculus class, and it was too good to be true. I actually understood what was going on. Rhonda was such an amazing professor that I started to like math.”

• Read the complete interview with Dr. Cheng.