Fang Cheng, born in August 1938, graduated from the Department of Astronomy at Nanjing University in 1959. He was promoted to be an associate professor in 1981 and a doctoral supervisor and professor in 1986. In 1995, he was rated as an academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences and in 2005 an academician of the Academy of Sciences for Developing Countries (Third World Academy of Sciences).

He served as a visiting scholar at the Paris Observatory (Observatoire de Paris) from 1980 to 1982 and as a special member of the China Center of Advanced Science and Technology and director of the Sub-Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics from 1988 to 1989. From 1993 to 1997, he served as the dean of the Department of Astronomy at Nanjing University and president of the Chinese Astronomical Society from 1998 to 2002. From 2003 to 2009 he served as a vice president of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and from 2004 to 2009 as a vice president of Jiangsu Association for Science and Technology.

From 1990 to 2001, he was invited to France and Japan for cooperative research as a visiting professor by the Paris Observatory and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan for six times. He used to be the head of the Astronomy Review Group of the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the editorial board member of the International Solar Physics, the chief scientist of the “Multi-Band Observation and Research on Intense Astronomical Activities” of the Climbing Program, and the chief editor of Chinese Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysics (ChJAA). He now serves as the deputy director of the academic committee of Nanjing University.

Methods of Astrophysics, Magnetic Fluid Mechanics, and Physics in the Solar Active Regions.

His research focuses on solar physics. He took the lead in designing and developing China's first solar tower and founded the Solar Tower Laboratory. He presided over more than 20 projects at the national level and of international cooperation and has published 270 papers in Chinese and international academic journals, with major achievements made in the flare of atmospheric evolution, flare dynamics model and the asymmetry of the spectrum, semi-empirical models of white flares, prominences, sunspots, microflares and Ellerman bomb, non-thermoionization and excitation effects of hydrogen during flares and spectroscopic diagnosis of non-thermal processes of flares, magnetic reconnection in the lower atmosphere of the sun.

He is also the co-author of a monograph and the editor-in-chief of Dacihai (the astronomy volume) and participated in the editing of Astronomy Nouns in Cihai many times. He has been invited to deliver dozens of papers at various academic conferences at home and abroad. He won the second prize of the National Science and Technology Progress Award in 1985, the first prize of the National Science and Technology Progress Award of the National Education Commission in 1995, the third prize of the National Natural Science Award in 1997, the first prize of the National Science and Technology Award nominated by the Ministry of Education in 2004, and the Ho Leung Ho Lee Foundation Award in 2004. In 1998, he was awarded the title of a national model worker in the education sector and the title of National Model Teacher. In 2008, he was awarded the Doctor of Honor of Paris Observatory, becoming the first Chinese scientist in history to receive such an honor. In recognition of his contributions, the asteroid No.185538 was named as Fang Cheng Asteroid.