Hi there! I am a third-year Ph.D. student in mathematics at the University of Washington, Seattle. I am jointly advised by Jarod Alper and Sara Billey. I am interested in Schubert calculus, equivariant intersection theory, and moduli theory. I am also passionate about formalization of mathematics and using machine learning to aid mathematical discoveries.
I completed my B.A. studies at the University of Pennsylvania in 2023, double-majoring in mathematics and linguistics, and received an M.A. in Applied Math & Computer Science. Outside of mathematics, you will often find me on the tennis or basketball court, or trying to learn a foreign language.
I am on the organizing team of the UW 2026 Lean Hackathon.
- zengrf at uw dot edu
- Office
- Padelford C-20, UW Seattle
- CV
- Download curriculum vitae (not up-to-date!)
How to pronounce my name
- Mandarin
- zēng (high tone) — ruò (falling tone) — fán (rising tone)
- Cantonese
- zang1 — joek6 — faan4
- Japanese On'yomi
- sou — jyaku — han
- Korean
- jeung — yak — beom
You might know me as Michael, マイケル, or Миша.
Recent activity
- ICARM Summer School on Formalization in Lean. ICARM, Carnegie Mellon University, July 2026.
- CMND 2026 Thematic Program: Algebraic Combinatorics and Applications. University of Notre Dame, June 2026.
- ICARM Workshop on Algebraic Geometry and Machine Learning. ICARM, Carnegie Mellon University, June 2026.
- M0,ntréal ISM Discovery School: Combinatorics of Moduli of Curves. UQAM, May 2026.
- Graduate Student Topology and Geometry Conference. Rutgers University, April 2026.
- Graduate Student Combinatorics Conference, University of Illinois-Chicago, March 2026.
- Western Algebraic Geometry Symposium. UCSD, March 2026.
Last updated 2026‑04‑18.