He earned a bachelor's degree in
Applied Mathematics from
Fudan University in 1984. He went to graduate school at
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 1985 and received a Master's degree in Mathematics and then Ph.D. in Statistics in 1989. He joined the
University of Michigan as H. C. Carver Collegiate Professor in 2011, and served as Department Chair from 2015 to 2020. He was appointed as the inaugural chair of the department of Statistics and Data Science at
Washington University in St. Louis on July 1, 2023. His prior appointments include faculty positions at
National University of Singapore and University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. His research interests include theory and methodology in
robust statistics, semiparametric models,
quantile regression, data depth, dimension reduction, and subgroup analysis. His interdisciplinary research aims to promote the better use of statistics in biosciences, climate studies, dysphagia research, and social-economic studies. ==Honors and awards==