Homecoming Gala cum Campus Run
Alumni, students, staff and families are welcome to join a host of activities at the “CityU Homecoming Gala cum Campus Run” scheduled on 19 March. Under the theme "Let's march forward for a splendid future", the event has been organised by the Alumni Relations Office. Among the games and programmes will be a Campus Run, Homecoming Big Party, Celebrity Sharing, Alumni Flea Market, Interest Workshops, Open House cum City Hunt, game booths, bouncy house and food stalls. For more information, visit here.
Discovery Festival
The 2017 CityU Discovery Festival from 7 to 9 March will showcase our strengths in discovery and innovation, the centrepiece of our Discovery-enriched Curriculum (DEC). The Discovery Festival enables students to learn about their choices of majors, minors and Gateway Education (GE) courses, thereby helping them with their academic planning and decision-making. For more information, visit here.
Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) events
IAS brings together some of the best minds in science and engineering to pursue curiosity-driven ideas and studies. This month three IAS Distinguished Lectures and a workshop pursue a number of interdisciplinary discussions on a range of topics. Professor Bradley Nelson, Head of the Multi-Scale Robotics Lab, Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering at ETH Zürich, will deliver a talk titled “Microrobotics and Nanomedicine: Future Directions in Medical Robotics” on 8 March. Professor Alexander M. Korsunsky, Professor at Department of Engineering Science, University of Oxford, will give a talk titled “Understanding Stresses and Strains across the Scales” on 22 March. Professor Jean Salençon, Senior Fellow of IAS, and a Member of the French Academy of Sciences, will give a talk titled “Equilibrium and Forces: from Aristotle to Lagrange” on 22 March. The workshop, which takes place from 8 to 9 March, is titled “Structures and Properties of High Entropy Alloys (HEAs)”. For more information, visit here.
President’s Lecture Series
Since 1997 when the first human avian influenza cases were reported in Hong Kong, the virus has continued to spread to many parts of the world. In the next instalment of the President’s Lecture Series: Excellence in Academia, Professor Dirk Pfeiffer of CityU’s School of Veterinary Medicine will discuss the role of eco-social system complexity in the spread of avian influenza virus among wild birds, domestic poultry and humans. Professor Pfeiffer is Chair Professor of One Health at CityU. As a veterinary epidemiologist, his research deals with animal disease control in many countries around the world. The lecture takes place on 29 March.
CityU Distinguished Lectures
Three lectures this month bring experts in applied physics, microfluidics and law to the City University Distinguished Lectures Series. These talks are a great way to introduce leading international experts from a variety of disciplines to campus. Professor Evelyn L. Hu, Tarr-Coyne Professor of Applied Physics Electrical Engineering at the John Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University, will give a talk titled “Where Imperfections Lead to Opportunity: Photonic Defect-Based Devices in SiC” on 16 March. Professor David Weitz, Mallinckrodt Professor of Physics and Applied Physics at Harvard University, will give a talk titled “Dripping, jetting, drops and wetting: The magic of microfluidics” on 21 March. Professor Hugh Collins, Vinerian Professor of English Law at the University of Oxford, will give a talk titled “Private Law and Fundamental Rights” on 28 March.
Floral photography competition
Great prizes await the best photographs taken of the magnificent Brazil bougainvillea plant on our beautiful campus. The Brazil bougainvillea was selected as our floral emblem by the campus community. The plant, which is tough, highly resilient and blossoms throughout the year, strongly reflects the University’s character. The winner of the contest will receive a MacBook Pro; the 1st runner-up, a Fujitsu Lifebook computer; the 2nd runner-up, a Canon digital camera; the most “Likes” award, a Fitbit watch; and the merit awards, $400 gift vouchers. For more details, visit here.
New sustainability lecture series
In support of efforts to promote sustainability in teaching, research and student activities, a new series of specially commissioned talks aims to focus attention on concepts and data needed to better comprehend sustainability and to design sustainability initiatives. The series, titled “CityU Sustainability Lecture Series”, has the support of CLP and the Hong Kong government. The lead organiser at CityU is Dr Justin Robertson, Associate Professor in the Department of Asian and International Studies. The first lecture, titled “Setting the Bottom Line for the Planet's Future”, was delivered at CityU on 3 March by Dr David Suzuki, a scientist, broadcaster, author and co-founder of the David Suzuki Foundation. Other lectures in the series will be held later this year and into 2018.
CityU Badminton Tournament 2017
The highly popular Badminton Tournament is upon us once again. Jointly organised by Student Development Services (Physical Education Section) and the Staff Social Club, the tournament is now in its 16th year. Players are invited to sign up in four possible categories: Individual: Singles & Doubles (Staff/Student/Alumni); Staff & Student; Family (Parent-Kid Doubles/Spouse Doubles); and Team (Staff only). The deadline for entry is 15 March; and the final event will be held on 8 April. For more information, visit here.
Language forum
Understanding the nature of language and its formative role in society and culture is an important part of academic study at CityU. Professor Shigenori Wakabayashi of the Faculty of Letters at Chuo University in Japan will talk about learning English at an inaugural talk marking the start of a major new series of events in the Department of Linguistics and Translation related to this mission. Educated at the University of Cambridge, Professor Wakabayashi researches modelling second language learners’ mental representations, knowledge systems, and language use. For more information, contact LTenquiry@cityu.edu.hk.
Kudos
Two Chair Professors in the Department of Electronic Engineering won the First and Second Class Award in the Natural Science category at the 2016 Higher Education Outstanding Scientific Research Output Awards (Science and Technology) from the Ministry of Education. Professor Leung Kwok-wa won the First Class Award for his project “Theory and Application of Dielectric Resonator Antenna”, a collaborative research project with a scholar from South China University of Technology. Professor Ron Chen Guanrong received the Second Class Award for his project “Distributed Cooperative Control of Multi-agent Systems”, a collaborative research project with three scholars from Southeast University, Nanjing. The annual Higher Education Outstanding Scientific Research Output Awards (Science and Technology), which were set up by the Ministry of Education, reward outstanding achievements in fundamental and applied research of natural science conducted by scientists.
Wong Chun-kit, a final-year student in the Department of Electronic Engineering (EE), has been awarded the IEEE MTT-S Undergraduate/Pre-graduate Scholarship for Spring 2017 by the IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society (MTT-S), US. This is the seventh time that one of our students has received this award. The winning research project proposal, titled "A Terahertz Near-Field Measurement System", was supervised by Professor Chan Chi-hou of EE. IEEE MTT-S awards up to ten undergraduate/pre-graduate scholarships each for the fall and spring semester. The purpose of these scholarships is to attract students to the microwave and RF discipline, and to encourage them to pursue careers in the field or a PhD degree.
Chan Yin-hei and Xin Yan, also students in EE, teamed up with Hung Lok-bun, a student in the Department of Economics and Finance, and Ye Wenliang, a student in the Department of Accountancy, to win the Best Presentation Award in the Inter-University Algo Trading Contest 2016/17. The winning project, which was supervised by Dr Ray Cheung Chak-chung, Associate Professor of EE, and Dr Michael Wong Chak-sham, Associate Professor in the Department of Economics and Finance, was called “Salomon UPT Strategy”.
The CityU Sports Teams performed strongly in recent intercollegiate sports competitions organised by the University Sports Federation of Hong Kong. The men’s team won the tennis, squash, table tennis, and taekwondo competitions. The women’s team got the first runners-up spot for the same sports except for taekwondo, in which the team got the second runners-up position.