Lenhard Ng Wins Simons Award

In March 2015, it was announced by the Simons Foundation that Professor Lenhard (Lenny) Ng was awarded a Simons Fellowship for the 2015-2016 year (July 1, 2015 to June 30, 2016). He is among the 40 mathematicians in North America to earn the fellowship. It provides a semester-long leave from teaching and administrative duties for the purpose of advancing basic research.

Professor Ng will be using it to extend a semester sabbatical leave from Duke to the full academic year. Professor Ng say "This enables me to travel more extensively during the school year, including to the Institut Mittag-Leffler in Stockholm, Sweden for the Fall 2015 program "Symplectic Geometry and Topology" that I am co-organizing, and to the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton in the spring semester for the program "Geometric Structures on 3-manifolds." I am splitting time between those locations and Duke.”

Professor Ng went on to say ”I am tremendously honored and fortunate to receive this award. The flexibility to be able to concentrate on research for an entire year is unusual. The Simons Fellowship provides an unparalleled opportunity for me to work on research projects that have already started and begin new projects as well. My core research fields are in three-dimensional topology and symplectic geometry, but I am also pursuing collaborations with physicists working in string theory, and the fellowship will help me work in all of these directions.”