C.N. Yang Institute for Theoretical Physics

A towering figure in theoretical physics, Chen-Ning Yang (1922 - 2025) played a key role in the development of Stony Brook University.   The YITP and Department of Physics and astronomy organized this event to celebrate his defining influence on the character of the university in the context of his world-famous contributions to science.  It includes personal remembrance and recollections, from colleagues, friends and family as well as perspectives of his work on the world stage and on campus.

On November 22 2025, YITP director George Sterman was awarded an honorary doctorate by ETH Zurich. The award citation refers to Sterman's development of concepts that "enable precise tests of the fundamental laws of nature in particle physics".

The Institute’s founding director Chen-Ning (Frank) Yang died on October 18, 2025 at the age of 103. His passing is a loss for science and for the Stony Brook community, including those of us who had the good fortune to know him personally.

A historic figure in theoretical physics, Frank Yang joined Stony Brook in 1966 as the founding director of the Institute for Theoretical Physics, and retired from that role in 1999. His numerous and unique contributions to science made him universally recognized as one of the great theoretical physicists of the twentieth century. Yang-Mills theories, parity non-conservation, the Yang-Baxter equation and the geometric structure of gauge theories, all of which he pioneered, have become essential concepts and methods for the description of nature in its fundamental and emergent aspects. His list of major achievements and influences spans quantum field theory, particle, mathematical and condensed matter physics, and statistical mechanics.

Chen-Ning Yang came to the United States in 1944 for graduate study, and received his doctorate from the University of Chicago in 1948. Famously, he adopted the name Frank in homage to Benjamin Franklin. From 1949 to 1966 he was at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, coming to Stony Brook in 1966. Before that move, he had spent a number of summer visits at Brookhaven National Laboratory, where several of his major discoveries were made.

The Einstein Chair at the Institute for Theoretical Physics (now the Yang Institute for Theoretical Physics, YITP) was Frank’s longest academic appointment, 1966-1999. He once remarked that in a way he “grew up with Stony Brook”, and indeed, his arrival as a Nobel laureate at the new public university brought it the world’s attention. He assembled the Institute’s original faculty and led it up to the new century, supervising students and writing some of his most-cited papers. At Stony Brook, his presence stimulated the growth of physics in a wide range of areas. His conversations with James Simons, when Simons was Chair of the Department of Mathematics, led to a strengthening of connections between the two fields, and to a lifelong friendship. A symposium held on the occasion of his retirement brought together an unparalleled set of distinguished speakers.

An informal history of the YITP, and Frank’s role and legacy, which appeared in the Festschrift for the C.N. Yang Centenary (2022, World Scientific) by the Institute’s current director, George Sterman, can be found here.

It was from Stony Brook that Frank embarked on his first trip to a newly-reopened China in 1971, with many to follow. He consistently supported exchange in education and basic science. He relocated to Tsinghua University in 2003, a place where he spent part of his childhood. After that, Frank visited Stony Brook several times, and saw the establishment of the Simons Center for Geometry and Physics.

Speaking for all his colleagues at the Yang retirement symposium in 1999, Sterman wrote, “The beautiful discoveries you have made, and the elegant methods you have created, continue to enable us, in our best moments, to make discoveries and creations of our own, on which we can look back with pride.” This statement remains true, at Stony Brook and in the world beyond, twenty five years later. Chen-Ning Yang has entered the history of science that he helped create.

With the enthusiastic support of her colleagues and friends at the Institute, whose research and careers have been supported by her exceptional service over the past seven years, Dawn Huether has been recognized with a 2025 Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Professional Service.  The Chancellor's Awards is a SUNY-wide recognition "for consistently superior professional achievement".