书到用时方恨少，事非经过不知难
My research interests are mainly on the dynamics of galaxies, the structure of the Milky Way, gravitational lensing and searching for extrasolar planets with microlensing and transits. More recently, I also became interested in gravitational waves because of the first direct detection.
I obtained my bachelor degree from USTC (1988, China), PhD from Princeton (1992). I was a CfA Fellow at Harvard from 1992 to 1995. I then travelled around, spending almost 5 years in Germany (Max-Planck Institute for Astrophysics) and 10 years in the UK (Manchester), becoming a full professor in 2006. I eventually returned to China with my family (叶落归根) in 2010.
Experience
Employment
Chair, Department of Astronomy, Tsinghua University, 04/2019-Present
Director, Tsinghua Center for Astrophysics, Tsinghua University, 10/2014-8/2019
Researcher, National Astronomical Observatories of China, 10/2010-07/2018
Professor of astrophysics, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Univ. of Manchester, 08/2006-07/2019
Reader in astrophysics, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Univ. of Manchester, 10/2002-07/2006
Lecturer in astrophysics, Jodrell Bank Observatory, Univ. of Manchester, 1/2000-10/2002
Long-term postdoctoral fellow, Max-Planck Institute for Astrophysics, 9/1995-12/1999
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics Postdoctoral Fellow, 9/1992-8/1995
Education
PhD, Princeton University, 9/1988-8/1992
BsC, University of Science and Technology, 9/1984-8/1988
Awards
Paczynski scholar, August 2015 (Princeton University)
Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Research Award , April 2007
China-U.S. Physics Examination and Application (CUSPEA) , 1987
Board membership & editorship
I am on the board of the Thirty Meter Telescope (2010-) and the Science Advisory Committee at the nearby KIAA (2015-)
I am an editor of Science in China G and New Journal of Physics
Associate chair, Educational Guidance Board for Astronomy, Oct. 2018 -
Referees for the Astrophysical Journal, Monthly Notices, Astronomy and Astrophysics, Science, Nature etc, and a number of international funding agencies
Teaching
Current Courses
Fall 2017, 2018, 2019: Galactic Dynamics (graduate course) (星系动力学, 32 lectures)
Fall 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019: Frontiers of Astrophysics (undergraduate) [天文学前沿] (32 lectures)
Fall 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019: Roaming between Physics and astrophysics (undergraduate) [漫游在物理和天文的交叉领域] (16 lectures)
Spring 2016, 2017 Discovering the Universe (undergraduate@ucas) [发现宇宙@国科大] (3 lectures)
Fall 2019 宇宙之美 The beauty of the Universe (undergraduate, 通识课) (16 lectures)
Past PhD students, undergrads and postdocs
PhD/Master : Martin Smith (2000-2003; professor@SHAO); Alex Wood (PhD, 2002-2006; industry); Dandan Xu (2006-2010.1; staff@Tsinghua); Szymon Kozlowski (2004-2007; staff@Warsaw); Richard Long (2005-2009; researcher@NAOC); Sarah Bryan (2007-2010; industry); Matthew Penny (2008-2011; Sagan Fellow@Ohio State); Jian Wang (2010-2012; industry); Ling Zhu (2010-2014; a faculty at SHAO); Qiran Xia (2011-2016; banking); Hongyu Li (2014-2018; industry [Baidu AI]); Yunpeng Jin (2014.9-2020.1; postdoc@SHAO); Shunsheng Li (Master, 2016.9-2019.9; PhD@Leiden); Li Ma (Master, 2016.9-2019.9; high school teacher)
Undergrads (selected) : Benedikt Diemer (2007-2008@Manchester; PhD@Chicago, 2015; postdoc@Harvard, 2016); Weichen Wang (2015-2016; PhD@John Hopkins); Wei Zhu (2013-2014; PhD@Ohio State, postdoc@CITA); Ruizhu Chen (Jan. 2011, visiting undergrad; PhD@Stanford); Sizheng Ma (2015-2017, Tsinghua undergrad; PhD@caltech); Xiaohan Wu (2016-2017, PKU undergrad; PhD@Harvard); Luchuan Liu (2017-2018, Tsinghua; PhD@USTC); Yunchong Wang (2016-2019; PhD@Stanford); Xinlun Cheng (2017-2019; PhD@Virginia); Tianshu Wang (2016-2019; PhD@Princeton); Yan Liang (2018-2019, 北航; PhD@tsinghua); Hongjin Yang (2018-2019, Xiameng; PhD@tsinghua)
Postdocs (selected) : Kyu-Hyun Chae (2001-2003) (Professor, Sejong University/South Korea); Nick Rattenbury (2004-2009) (Rutherfellow, New Zealand); Zheng Zheng (2014-2017, staff@NAOC); Xiaojia Zhang (2016-2018, postdoc@Hong Kong), Yiping Shu (2015-2017, now a staff member at MPO; currently at Cambridge); Xiaolei Meng (2016.12-2018.7); Junqiang Ge (2013-2019); Roberto Jaimes (2018.9-2019.1)
Current (or recent) students and postdocs
Master and PhD students : Rui Guo (2013.9-); Chao Li (2014.9-); Shengdong Lu (2016.9-); Weicheng Zang (2017.9-); Tianjun Gan (2018.9-); Hongjin Yang (2019.9-); Renkun Kuang (2020.1-), joint PhD student
Undergrads : Yawei Su (2018-, 4th year, Tsinghua); Xiaohan Wang (2019-, 3rd year, Tsinghua); Boyi Ding (2019-, 2nd year, Tsinghua); Youquan Fu (2019-, 2nd year, Tsinghua); Zerui Liu (2019-, 2nd year, Tsinghua).
Postdoc and fixed-term staff : Xiaocheng zheng (2016-);
Research
Research interests
Galactic dynamics , Gravitational microlensing , Gravitational lensing
Projects
Ministry of Science & Technology project (2018-2023) 科技部重点专项（首席科学家）, 基金委创新群体项目PI (NSFC distinguished group, PI), Pilot B (先导B首席科学家, 2014-2017) ,
SDSS-IV MaNGA , Thirty Meter Telescope , Telescope Access Program (2011-2017)
Selected publications ( Full refereed publications on ADS )
Assessing the Jeans Anisotropic Multi-Gaussian Expansion method with the Illustris simulation, Li, H. Y., Li, R., Mao, S. Xu, D. D., Long, R. J., Emsellem, E. 2016, 455, 3680
Made-to-measure galaxy models - I. Methodology, Long, R. J. Mao, S. 2010, MNRAS, 405, 301
Effects of Dark Matter Substructures on Gravitational Lensing: Results from the Aquarius Simulations, Xu, D. D., Mao, S., et al. 2009, MNRAS, 398, 1235
Anomalous Flux Ratios in Gravitational Lenses: For or against Cold Dark Matter? Mao, S., Jing, Y. P., Ostriker, J. P., Weller, J. 2004, ApJ, 604, 5
Evidence for substructure in lens galaxies? Mao, S., & Schneider, P. 1998, MNRAS, 295, 587
The Formation of Galactic Disks, Mo, H.J., Mao, S., & White, S.D.M. 1998, MNRAS, 295, 319
On the Cosmological Model of Gamma-Ray Bursts, Mao, S., & Paczynski, B. 1992, ApJ, 339, L1
Gravitational Microlensing by Double Stars and Planetary Systems, Mao, S., & Paczynski, B. 1991, ApJ, 374, L37
Public Outreach
I am in charge of the Tsinghua-NAOC public lecture series "New Worlds, New Horizons"
I am the editor for the wechat astronomy column for the Intellectuals (知识分子） published in Chinese (I was the editor for a similar column for Mr. Science 赛先生 for over a year.) Each article is usually read by more than 10,000 people, some by more than 40,000 people (for a taste, see English transcripts of interviews with Profs. Brian Schmidt, Richard McCray, John Peacock, Rana Adahkari, James Binney. )
Contact
Office: 623 Meng Min Wei Science building (蒙民伟科技大楼）, Tsinghua University
Office@NAOC: A502 NAOC , Chinese Academy of Sciences
Email: smao [at] tsinghua.edu.cn
