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Honorary Degree Citations (in order of degree presentation)
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t@Ell@Id%AlDr CHAN Sui Kau, Doctor of Social Sciences honoris causa
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Professor Aaron J CIECHANOVER, Doctor of Science honoris causa
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Professor Shuji NAKAMURA, Doctor of Engineering honoris causa
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Professor Chia-Wei WOO, Doctor of Business Administration honoris causa
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Professor David J GROSS, Doctor of Science honoris causa
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Address by Professor David J GROSS
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Medal Citations
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Michael G Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching
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President's Outstanding Service Award
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Addresses by Graduate Representatives
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Graduates in the School of Business and Management
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Graduates in the School of Science
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Graduates in the School of Humanities and Social Science
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Degrees Conferred
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Titles of PhD Theses Completed in 2007-08
President's Address
Professor Paul Ching-Wu
CHU
Mr Pro-Chancellor, Chairman, Council and Court Members, honorees, parents, graduates, colleagues, ladies and gentlemen:
This congregation is my eighth. It is also my last as president of this university. Today, my feelings are the same as our graduating students' who see this as a day with special meaning. As many of you know, my term as president runs out in August next year. It is a bit too early to say goodbye, but it is never too early to publicly declare how proud I feel about this university and how sorry I am in leaving this institution.
Between now and end of August next year, there will be few idle moments for me. I will be like the strong-legged red rooster, up at the crack of dawn to scratch together projects for this community. The university has a very busy agenda this year. We are gearing up for the new campus development to get ready for the 3-3-4 education reform. Recruiting additional faculty from overseas is also a top priority. I know it doesn't sound nice, but the financial tsunami now sweeping world markets has actually made our overseas recruitment exercise a little easier.
I am grateful for the privilege of leading and serving this university, and am happy to report that over the last seven years, we have consolidated our gains in international rankings. We are now rated 39th overall in the world this year. In business education, we are at the top of the academic ladder. Our joint EMBA program
with the Kellogg School of Business has been voted the number one program of its kind in the world last year, and voted number two this year. So every year we are literally in Chinese
"&-&L".
I have had many memorable, exciting and proud moments here with our faculty members and students. I am also grateful to my team of administrators and assistants. They work long hours to cater to the university's every need, and often for my personal needs. I call them my "7-11" team. My wife thinks that they have spoiled me. She is already taking steps to get me ready for my decompression, after I leave office. These days, if I ask her to make me a cup of tea, she would tell me to get it myself. Now, that's good domestic training, because in the US nobody gets you a cup of tea, or a cup of anything.
HKUST's name and fame may be built by its teachers and researchers. But behind them is a terrific team of workers who have made the achievements possible. That's why this year we have established the President's Outstanding Service Award for the first time for our non- academic staff. Let us hear it for our inaugural winners!
A university president wears many hats. One of them goes by the title of "fundraiser-in-chief". Thanks to the generous spirit of civic-minded leaders like Dr Chan Sui Kau, one of our honorees today, this duty has been both fruitful and enjoyable.
Like the conductor of an orchestra, the university president often receives the applause for the outstanding performance of his players. Our wonderful team of high-achieving scientific players has given me many occasions to receive the ovation of the outside world. For example, when I was attending conferences overseas, I was congratulated on more than one occasion for the work of our world renowned professors, such as Prof Ping Sheng, our nano specialist.
At the university, we don't live for rankings. We live for our students and our pursuit of knowledge. The success of a university is to a large extent measured by the performance of its students. Prof Nakamura, who has wonderful hands with machines, will be pleased to know that we have in our midst a mechanically inventive student who has built a remote-controlled mini-helicopter that was used in search and rescue missions during the recent Sichuan earthquake disaster.
We are greatly honored that Prof Nakamura, Prof Ciechanover and Prof Gross have kindly consented to join the International Advisory Board to guide the work of our Institute for Advanced Study, which a major initiative by the university to assert intellectual leadership in Asia and the world. Prof Gross, who speaks today on behalf of our honorees, has also been very generous with his advice and support of our Institute for Advanced Study.
It is also fitting that one of our founding fathers, Prof Chia-Wei Woo, today also becomes the favorite son of HKUST upon receiving an honorary doctorate from the very institute that he founded.
As the time of leadership transition approaches, I want to thank every member of this community for making my tenure a period of pride and the high watermark of my life. Like Prof Woo, I may be away, but I will always be hovering over this university in spirit. We have a proud record to defend, and a higher plateau to ascend to. Education may be a long-term business, but it is full of urgencies and priorities that can't wait. As HKUST gets ready for the third wave of leadership, let us allow no gap to appear and keep Hong Kong proud and the world cheering. Nothing, after all, succeeds like success.
Thank you.
Doctor of Social Sciences honoris causa
Dr
CHAN
Sui
Kau
Citation
Economically, Hong Kong first made its mark in the world as a producing city whose hallmark is quality and efficiency. One of its pillar industries was garment making whose stellar members included Yangtzekiang Garment Ltd. Its founder was none other than Dr Chan Sui Kau.
When people speak of the garment industry in this part of the world, Dr Chan's name almost always comes to mind. His fabled career is a snapshot of the glory of Hong Kong's old economy and its modern day entrepreneurial spirit.
Hong Kong boasts more millionaires per square mile than any other city on earth. Many amassed their wealth through the property or the stock market. Dr Chan belongs to a minority who did not. He made his money the old-fashioned way-by making things and marketing them.
They say t h a t "great things have small beginnings". From a shoestring operation in its early days, Dr Chan's business empire has grown through years of diligence and perseverance to become a diversified conglomerate with 15,000 staff members on the payroll, stretching from Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, the Chinese Mainland and the Pacific Rim to western countries. Yet he often refers self- mockingly to himself as "a biggish fish in a small puddle". But if this puddle stands for the garment industry, then his aquatic presence is big indeed.
The garment industry is made up of several segments
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spinning, weaving, knitting, dyeing and clothing - each with its own chamber of commerce. Seeing the need for a united voice, Dr Chan and other industry leaders formed what was known as the "Wednesday Club''. After meeting regularly for several years they formed the Textile Council ofHong Kong in 1988 and, with unanimous support, Dr Chan became its first Chairman. On issues that matter to the textile and garment industries, the Council often conveyed its views and concerns to the Government. After prolonged lobbying efforts, in which Dr Chan played a key role, the industry gained a seat in the Legislative Council under the functional constituency category.
Over the years, Dr Chan, always mindful of his larger duties, fought hard to protect the interests of the industry. His most notable victory was the determined fight in the early 1960s for an equitable share of the garment quotas for the manufacturers when the quota system was first imposed. The colonial government of the day had leaned towards giving all the quotas to the British and Indian expatriate exporters. At this critical juncture, Dr Chan joined forces with the late Mr Lam Kan Shing and representatives from major chambers of commerce to lobby for a fair quota system. The result was that the quotas were split evenly between the manufacturers and the exporters. This brought about over three decades of steady growth for Hong Kong's garment industry, making it one of the territory's pillar industries.
But he did more than just taking care of his business peers. He knew that a healthy garment industry must first take care of its workers. An employer he might be, but he was a man trusted by all parties, including labor and the government, for his even-handedness. He became the voice of reason in the industry, seeking to balance the needs of the business owners against the welfare of the workers. To ensure that long-serving employees get their well-deserved reward, Dr Chan deployed his considerable energies and negotiation skills to hammer out a reward scheme for long service. 8
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HONORARY DEGREE CITATIONSThis was hailed by the then Council members as a milestone achievement in the history of Hong Kong's labor negotiations.
His involvement with labor relations in Hong Kong was multi-faceted over multi-decades, sewing many terms on various committees under the Labour Advisory Board - including the Committee
on Employment Services, Committee on Labour Relations, Committee on Employees' Compensation, and Committee on Industrial Safety and Health -
either as chairman or as member. In addition, he was Chairman of the Board's Sub-committee on Employment Services Fundraising. He also served on the Hong Kong Panel of Arbitrators.
Always a big picture man, he paid particular attention to the long-term development of the industry through his chairmanship of the Garment Advisory Committee of the Hong Kong Trade Development Council, chairmanship of the Clothing Industry Training Authority, presidency of the Federation of Hong Kong Garment Association as well as membership of the Hong Kong Textile Advisory Board. As the garment industry became mature and robust, Dr Chan turned his energies towards the promotion of education, and became a member of Hong Kong Polytechnic's Institute of Textile and Clothing.
On the foundation of his own business success, he turned to financing schools in his native Dongguan, Shunde, Panyu and other places. His generosity to universities is legendary, and beneficiaries included Peking University, Shanghai Jiaotung University, Panyu Polytechnic, Dongguan Polytechnic, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong Baptist University, City University of Hong Kong, and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He also donated to medical institutions on the Mainland. He might not be in the first league of local super- rich tycoons, but it is said that proportionately, he has given away more of his net worth than most.
Since 1999, when the China Synergy Program for Outstanding Youth was initiated by Ms Leung Kwok
Ching to give overseas Chinese university students a good understanding of modern China and their own cultural roots, Dr Chan has generously supported this annual program. Over 220 ethnic Chinese tertiary students, the majority from overseas, would visit Hong Kong and several major Mainland cities. The program is endorsed by the China Overseas Friendship Association, the Ministry of Education, the All-China Youth Federation, the Liaison Office of the Central People's Government in the Hong Kong SAR, Hong Kong's nine universities and several top Mainland universities, and has the blessing of the State as well as domestic and overseas institutions. As one of the chairmen of the Program's organizing committee, Dr Chan has made significant contributions to its success over the years.
For his life-long professional and philanthropic services, Dr Chan was appointed a Justice of the Peace in 1983, and received an OBE from Queen Elizabeth the Second of Britain in 1988, and the Gold Bauhinia Medal from the Hong Kong SAR Government in 2002. This year, the Hong Kong SAR Government bestowed on Dr Chan its highest form of honor, the Grand Bauhinia Medal. From 1993 to 2003, Dr Chan was appointed a member of the 8th and 9th People's Political Consultative Committee of the People's Republic of China. He is also an Honorable Citizen of the cities of Dongguan, Guangzhou, Foshan, and Wuxi in the Jiangsu Province.
Within the industry, there is a catchphrase, "If you need help, call Uncle Kau". Uncle Kau never turns away anybody who comes to him for help. He has done it for the industry, and he has done it for people within and without the industry.
Mr Pro-Chancellor, on behalf of the Council of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, I have the great honor of presenting
to
you Dr Chan Sui Kau, Chairman of the Yangtzekiang Garment Ltd., for the award of Doctor of Social Scienceshonoris causa.
Doctor o f Science honoris causa
Professor Aaron J CIECHANOVER
Citation
For many great scientists, their scientific dreams often started young. Prof Aaron J Ciechanover began his early by collecting flowers, leaves and the skeletons of snakes, fish, frogs and turtles. This "amateurish flirting with biology" was to grow into a thirst for formalized knowledge of biology and chemistry. Thanks to wonderful teachers, this love affair morphed into passionate probings of the big questions in science.
Having chosen medicine as a compromise between the domestic need for financial security and his natural curiosity about biology and chemistry, Prof Ciechanover could easily have stayed in clinical medicine. But he was drawn to the pursuit of the causative rather than the symptomatic in pathology. It took self-knowledge and moral courage to choose the uncertainty of a life in scientific research over the economic and social certainty of a practicing physician. For a person of Jewish descent, this choice was not easy, for as he himself puts it, "medicine has traditionally been the ultimate in Jewish professions." Even though he graduated from medical school, the world is to know him not as a medical doctor, but as a research scientist who eventually went on to win the ultimate prize in chemistry.
Thus began five years of exciting graduate studies. Later, he spent three years at MIT where he learned how to approach a scientific problem. In his own words, he learned two principles: "first, to select an important biological problem, preferably an unobvious and a non-mainstream one", and second, "to make sure that there are appropriate research tools to approach it experimentally." He learned to "dig deep into a problem, to question, to doubt, to ask and to
discuss". He showed courage in swimming against the tide and in believing in his own gut feeling.
The world is grateful that he chose a life of discovery for what follows is the discovery of life's own death-labeling system. Prior to this, scientists have concentrated on the synthesis of proteins. But Prof Ciechanover and his doctoral thesis mentor Prof Avram Hershko decided to go against the stream and delve into the obverse process of how proteins break down. In doing so, they unlocked the secrets of the function of a regulatory system that is central to the cell. This understanding is highly useful in the production of new drugs for various types of diseases, such as certain malignancies, immunological malfunctions, and neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's disease. Some drugs are already in use, others are in the pipeline all because of this revolutionary cognition. Thanks to this breakthrough, we now understand how the cell controls a number of key biochemical processes. The small protein that will forever be linked to Prof Ciechanover's name is "ubiquitin", which in Latin means "everywhere", and is found in all cells of high organisms, from yeast, through to plants and above.
This major breakthrough in medical research shows that Prof Ciechanover's early belief that the future "resided in biology" and in deciphering the basic molecular processes was right. Characteristically, in his own modest manner, he attributed his scientific achievements to "sheer luck or serendipity" or "probably both''. But we know that luck favors the ready and the stubborn who have the patience to peel off layers of problems the way one peels off layers of an onion. Much of Prof Ciechanover's learning came not from formal lessons but in mentorship 12
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HONORARY DEGREE CITATIONSrelationships, in critically adopting his mentors' way of thinking, and different mentors offered different intellectual environments to challenge his thinking.
In certain ways, Prof Ciechanover's values and attitudes have close affinity with the Chinese. One of those dominant values is gratitude. Growing up parentless after the early death of his parents, he was taken under the wings of his aunt, and later of his brother and sister-in-law. To them, and even to his wife and son, he has expressed profound gratitude for their emotional and physical support. He considers them "wonderful life partners" who enabled him to fly high, in his own words, "on the wings of my dreams". This grateful appreciation extends also to his mentors and collaborators who contributed to his apprenticeship as a scientist. First and foremost, his graduate studies advisor, Prof Avram Hershko, with whom he shared the Nobel Prize for the breakthrough discovery. Heshko represented the ideal balance between original, bold, daring and visionary scientist on the one hand and a well controlled one on the other. He singles out Ernie Rose, another fellow eminent scientist and collaobrator, and the third awardee, for showing him that "methodical thinking is not always necessary in science" and may even be counter-productive at times, and that "being erratic and disordered and even absent-minded, thinking in a most unconventional manner, can yield wonderful ideas and results." He finds this approach fertile in stirring feelings of instability, allowing him to challenge basic assumptions and knowledge. He soars high on the wings of the non-traditional. And finally, he expresses a debt of gratitude to his MIT mentor Harvey Lodish for granting him complete freedom to pursue his own passionate ideas, and for adopting a "passive- active educational approach" in their intellectual relationship. It is this ability to appreciate the unorthodox that makes for a great scientific mind. In describing his feelings of gratitude Prof Ciechanover has given us a glimpse of his own scientific attitude and secrets of success.
For his bold and seminal thinking and his concrete scientific achievements, Prof Ciechanover has been honored and garlanded by scientific bodies and academic institutions the world over. His list of accolades runs into multiple pages that no ordinary citation can do full justice. He was awarded with numerous honorary doctorates, and he courted as a member by various eminent scientific bodies throughout the world, from the Israeli National Academy of Sciences and Humanities, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences of the Vatican, the American Philosophical Society to the National Academy of Sciences and recently the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. Before the Nobel Prize he was awarded the prestigious Albert Lasker Award in Basic Medical Research, regarded by many as the second most important Prize in biomedicine after the Nobel Prize.
He is a prolific writer of articles, reviews and books and has altogether close to 200 contributions. Given his medical background, it is not surprising that he also holds a couple of patents in the development of an anti-tumor agent and of the treatment of malignant cells. Only 61 years of age, Prof Ciechanover has lived a full and blessed life which more than compensated for his tragic orphanhood. Today, we celebrate the life of a humanistic scientist who has dared to go down the path least traveled and, following his intellectual daring and passion, come up with the results to gladden the hearts of every scientific discoverer and dreamer.
Mr Pro-Chancellor, on behalf of the Council of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, I have the great honor of presenting to you, Prof Aaron J Ciechanover, Distinguished Research Professor in the Faculty of Medicine of the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa, and 2004 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry for the award of Doctor of Science
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Doctor of Engineering honoris causa
Professor Shuji
NAKAMURA
Citation
Prof Shuji Nakamura should be everyone's technology hero. His is the ultimate story of the underdog who succeeded against all odds. Without a PhD, with few resources, and tucked away in an obscure company in a small town, toiling alone as an unknown engineer for ten years, he scored one of the biggest technological breakthroughs of the 20th century
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the first successful blue light-emitting diode, or LED. In doing so, he beat the giants of research in Japan, the US, and Europe to the punch, and made possible his subsequent development of green and white LEDs and the blue laser. His is a modern- day David and Goliath tale in the world of science and technology - one to warm all hearts. He has singularly demonstrated that great science does not require great funds.Prof Nakamura's science is real and applied, not theoretical. His groundbreaking achievements have far-reaching consequences for the life of people and for the health of the planet. The LED is considered by most to be the holy grail of lighting. Generating a lot of light but very little heat, the LED is 10 times more efficient and 40 times longer-lasting than an ordinary light bulb, with a life of 60,000 hours. This translates into huge energy savings and enormous reduction in carbon emissions. This environment-friendly source of light is revolutionizing the lighting industry.
Prof Nakamura's work h a s significant applications not just for lighting, but in many other industries as well. A couple of examples: His blue laser can be used to sterilize drinking water in less developed countries. With its shorter wavelength, the same blue laser light quadruples
the storage capacity of a CD or DVD and gives greater resolution to a laser printer.
Prof Nakamura is an inventor extraordinaire. He is mechanically inventive, imaginative, and resourceful. Working in a small company with limited funds, he could not afford to buy the necessary equipment other scientists take for granted. He had to fall back on his own devices, building his own apparatus based on papers he read and patents he studied. He even had to build his own hydrogen-oxygen-fueled furnace, capable of melting gallium at 1500 degrees Celsius. There were inherent risks in operating this unstable home-made furnace. Explosions were heard from time to time with dense white smoke billowing out of the windows of his laboratory. His co- workers would rush in to see if he was still alive. There is no prize for physical bravery in science. If there were, surely Prof Nakamura would be its first and worthiest recipient.
Prof Nakamura's race against the corporate research giants in a quest that had eluded them all seemed like a hopeless decade-long chase. Perseverance, however, is his middle name. Described as "crazy" at times even by his own R & D manager, Prof Nakamura was ultimately able to silence his critics and doubters. His revolutionary breakthrough was an unlikely accomplishment - unlikely until you consider that this lone scientist in less than ten years wrote or co-wrote 146 technical papers, 6 books and 10 book chapters on the subjects of his research. He received his PhD degree in 1994 from the University of Tokushima, where he had earlier earned his master's and bachelor's degrees. 16
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HONORARY DEGREE CITATIONSWhen his quest ended in triumph, he had put an obscure company, Nichia, on the island of Shikoku, on the world map of science and technology. When news of his intention to leave Japan leaked, he was inundated with offers of professorships from 10 American universities, two European ones and five US companies. On the day he left Japan, his departure was covered by no less than five Japanese TV networks
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not bad for this one-time underdog of science!When he left Japan in 1999, Prof Nakmaura accepted an appointment as Professor of Materials in the College of Engineering at UC Santa Barbara, where he is also the research director of the Solid State Lighting and Energy Center. He became a US citizen in 2005. Prof Nakamura has also held guest professorships at universities in German, Japan, and China.
For his s t u p e n d o u s achievements, a n d specifically for his significant contribution to global energy saving by developing highly efficient illumination systems, Prof Nakamura was awarded the 2006 Millennium Technology Prize by the government of Finland. Awarded every two years, this prize carries a cash value of one million euros, or nearly US$ 1.36 million. It is considered by many to be the equivalent, for technology, of the Nobel Prize, in both monetary value and prestige.
In 2002, Prof Nakamura achieved the rare feat of winning two major awards. He won The Economist's inaugural Innovation Award and was a co-recipient of the Takeda Award, which carried a prize 100 million yen. Honors and awards have continued to come thick and fast to Prof Nakamura- between 1994 and 2008, some 35 other awards were also heaped on him: the Nikkei BP Engineering Award in 1994 and 1996, the Sakura Award in 1995, the Materials Research Society Medal Award in 1997, the Innovation
in Real Materials Award in 1998, the British Rank Prize in 1998, the Julius-Springer Prize for Applied Physics in 1999, the Honda Award in 2000, the Asahi Award in 2001, the IEEE/ LEOS Quantum Electronics Award in 2002, the Franklin Institute's Medal in Engineering in 2002, the World Technology Award in 2002, The Blue Spectrum Pioneer Award in 2003, the Society for Information Display Karl Ferdinand Braun Prize in 2004, the Global Innovation Leader Award in 2006, the Santa Barbara Chamber of Commerce Innovator of the Year Award in 2007, and, most recently, the 2008 Prince of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Research.
What's next for Prof Nakamura? He is aggressively researching zero-energy-loss LEDs, which, as the name suggests, would be virtually 100 % energy-efficient. Many of his fellow scientists hold that current LEDs are already nearing the theoretical limit of efficiency. True to his iconoclastic nature, however, Prof Nakamura is determined to once again test the limits of improbability. Given his track record, no one is willing to bet against him this time.
Thanks to Prof Nakamura's brilliance, maverick spirit, perseverance, and inventiveness, our world is a brighter and better place.
Mr Pro-Chancellor, on behalf of the Council of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, I have the great honor of presenting to you Prof Shuji Nakamura, Professor of Materials at the University of California, Santa Barbara for the award of Doctor of Engineering honoris causa.
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(2008%)Doctor of Business Administration honoris causa
Professor Chia-Wei WOO
Citation
Institutional founders are a different breed. They are potent personalities with a dream to chase and energies to burn. They stand firm, see far and drive hard. They neither flinch nor retreat. In the case of Prof Chia-Wei Woo, founding president of HKUST, he can best be described as a paradox: a man of boldness and exactitude. Perhaps, he and his colleagues can only be described in Biblical terms, as men and women who parted the waters and literally moved mountains to build Hong Kong's miracle university.
Prof Woo found fame as the first ethnic Chinese American to head a major US university - San
Francisco State University. But he secured his place in history as an architect of HKUST. Building a university from scratch is a daunting challenge. Building a world-class university in a hurry is an impossibility. But for Prof Woo, nothing was beyond the pale of possibility.
At the time he was called away from the presidency of San Francisco State University, things were not exactly looking rosy for Hong Kong. It was a place to be going away from, not a place to be coming to. The city was then in the throes of political uncertainty, with its fate about to be decided by a tug-of-war between its then and future sovereign powers. Many of the city's elite were hedging their bets with a foreign passport in their hand and patriotism on their lips. During the 10-year lead-up to 1997, Hong Kong was hemmorhaging talents seeking the safer shores of America, Canada, or Down Under. Attracting first-rate academic talents to a city in flux was
essentially swimming against the current, for the brain drain was becoming a raging torrent.
But Prof Woo was undeterred. He was given a mission. And he was here to complete it. He reached into his bag of tricks and decades of academic friendships. He practiced the wily and wise ancient Chinese art of earnest entreaties -
calling repeatedly in person upon his targeted quarries in the best tradition of Liu Bei's respectful cultivation and courtship of Zhuge Liang, the supreme tactical master of the Three Kingdoms. Wherever he found them, he charmed and cajoled them into coming on board, often camping out on campuses and in hotels near their place of abode. This was a process he was to repeat for several years, until his "hit list" was filled and his faculty needs met. In this he had nothing but his strong conviction and iron will. He did not offer them the promised land. Instead, he preached a duty to serve what was soon to become part of the Motherland. Those who wavered finally succumbed to his dogged importunings and passionate sincerity. Methodically but painfully, Prof Woo had assembled his stable of tip-top talents at a time of turbulence in Hong Kong. These chosen men and women would soon propel the fledgling university to the forefront of academic excellence. Prof Woo is a miracle worker of the first order.
As for Prof Woo himself, he was blind to his own needs. He burned his bridges; he did what Winston Churchill would have approved: "Leap, and the net will appear. " But he did more. He leapt,
but not before cutting his own net by spurning an offer from The California State University System to hold his university professorship in abeyance pending his return from his Hong Kong mission.
"To get top academics from across the world to join me in a reverse exodus to Hong Kong, I must first totally uproot myself. Otherwise how can others believe me?" Such is his leadership style.
In a city with an uncharted future and a university with an unproven record, fundraising was a task not for the thin-skinned or the ill- connected. After a prolonged absence of more than 30 years from the city of his childhood, Prof Woo was essentially a stranger in a Hong Kong that only speaks the language of money and financial returns to institutions that are known quantities. Fortunately, he found a formidable ally in the doyen of local politics, Sir SY Chung, founding Council Chairman of the University, and some say, the guardian angel of HKUST. This indomitable duo managed to pry open the wallets of the rich and the powerful. Together with men and women sharing the same vision, Prof Woo created the best young university man can design and human ingenuity can build.
Before returning east, Prof Woo was already a giant in American higher education. In 1983, he ascended the presidency of San Francisco State University at the relatively young age of 45. By then he had already made his name in the field of physics, with some 120 papers and books in various branches of the discipline to his credit, demonstrating his scientific leadership in supervising the research work and thesis preparation of 25 doctoral and postdoctoral students.
Academic and social honors came copiously to Prof Woo. These included fellowships of the American Physical Society, and the California Academy of Sciences, the Alfred Sloan Research Fellowship, the Eleanor Roosevelt Humanitarian Award by the United Nations Association, the Golden Key of the City of San Francisco which did the unusual thing of declaring a "Chia- Wei Woo Day" in his honor. He held honorary professorships at Physics Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fudan University, Shenzhen University, and Peking University. In 1995, he was awarded an honorary Doctorate of Letters by Georgetown College. The following year, he received a Distinguished International Service Award from the University of Minnesota and an honorary Doctorate of Science from Washington University. Back in the east, he was recognized for his miracle-working powers, by being appointed an honorary "Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (CBE)" by Queen Elizabeth the Second of Great Britain. After the handover, in 2000, he was awarded the Gold Bauhinia Star by the Hong Kong SAR Government, followed by the "Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneurn by the President of France.
The list of his extra-academic honors is long and elongating. Governments and private industry flocked to him for wise counsel. In Hong Kong, he served on the Industry and Technology Development Council and the Board of Overseers for the Institute of Biotechnology. He was appointed a Hong Kong Affairs Advisor, then a Member of the Preliminary Working Committee and subsequently a Member of the Preparatory Committee by the Central Chinese government. He also sat on the Selection Committee for the Chief Executive of the HKSAR. Later, in 1998, he served on the Commission on Strategic Development of the HKSAR. The Central Government also
appointed him to the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. In 2000, he was named to the Council of Advisors on Innovation and Technology of HKSAR and Chairmanship of its Committee on Hong Kong-Mainland Technological Collaboration. A much sought-after public speaker, Prof Woo made multiple appearances at the World Economic Forum at Davos.
He is an early advocate of Hong Kong-Shenzhen cooperation who coined the term "Hong Kong Bay Area" more than a decade ago to describe the close-knit southern part of Pearl River Delta. For the City of Shenzhen, he serves as a Senior Advisor to the Municipal Government; the only non-Mainland Member on the Government's Policy Decision Advisory Committee; Chief Advisor on Higher Education Development; Advisor on the planning of Southern University of Science & Technology; and Director of Shenzhen- Hong Kong Development Research Institute under the auspices of the Peking University- HKUST Institution for Industry, Education, and Research which he helped found. He said: "Whatever I do for Shenzhen is also in service of Hong Kong, because the two cities will surely become but one metropolis in the foreseeable future. "
He is also a darling of private industry, serving on several corporate boards, including Lenovo Group, Shanghai Industrial, and First Shanghai, as well as a Senior Advisor to Hong Kong's Shui On Group. Outside Hong Kong, he advises a number of universities in China, as well as Senior Advisor to The College Board, the largest non-profit educational organization in America. Naturally, Prof Woo is listed both in the "Who's Who in America" and "Who's Who in the World".
But no honor or honorary title can ever replace the one that is gloriously his alone: "Founding President of HKUST - the world's fastest- climbing young university". The high rankings of the University in general, and the stratospheric rankings of its Business School in particular, continue to feed off his early efforts. His paternity is evident in the DNA of this young university. Through lofty rankings and frequent visits by adoring overseas delegations of curious academics or leaders, this University continues to pay silent tribute to its founding father.
Mr Pro-Chancellor, on behalf of the Council of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, I have the great honor of presenting to you Prof Chia-Wei Woo, President Emeritus and University Professor Emeritus, of HKUST for the award of Doctor of Business Administration honoris causa.
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Professor
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J
GROSS
Citation
Prof David J Gross, the 2004 co-winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics, is a man drawn to the probing of the secrets of the universe. He is also a man who is comfortable with paradoxical thinking. He says, for example, that "The more we know, the more aware we are of what we know not. Indeed, the most important product of knowledge is ignorance." He has spent his whole life asking intelligently "ignorant" but big questions about the universe.
He is a scientist who is duly respectful of Nature, and to whom "Theorists can be wrong. Nature is always right': When he delivered his Nobel lecture he did not forget to do the unusual thing of thanking Nature itself.
Prof Gross has lived a blessed life. Unlike other boys his age who dreamed of being firemen or cops, he had the advantage of knowing exactly what he wanted to be at the age of thirteen - a theoretical physicist. He is at his absolute best in asking the big and important questions. In fact his Nobel Prize was in recognition of the big questions he asked more than 30 years ago, except he had to wait that long for Nature's and the Nobel Committee's verdict.
Before Prof Gross made his important discovery, the field of theoretical physics was rich in experimentation but poor in theories. He was very much at home in speculative physics, and specifically in the pursuit of the enormous challenge of unifying all the forces of nature. In Prof Gross's own words, "Of the four forces observed
in nature, only gravity and electromagnetism were well understood. The other two forces, the weak force responsible for radioactivity and the strong nuclear force that operated within the nucleus, were largely mysterious." In the community of theoretical physicists, the general feeling was that the nuclear force is a phenomenon that was almost "unfathomable". One scientist, Freeman Dyson, even predicted that the right theory would not come along "for the next hundred years." Prof Gross defied that prediction and shortened the waiting period for this major theoretical breakthrough by three quarters of a century.
Prof Gross received his Nobel Prize in 2004, but the award was given in recognition for his solving in 1973 the "last great remaining problem of what has since come to be called the Standard Model". In other words, he was honored for his discovery with his co-recipients of how the nucleus of atoms works. Physicists have always wanted to understand the fundamental forces of nature, and understand what the fundamental building blocks are. Thanks to Prof Gross and his two other co-winners, we now know what these fundamental building blocks are. His "Asymptotic Freedom" theory describes the physics of quarks, the matter from which we are "to a very large extent built".
Prof Gross has the benefit of an international education. He received his bachelor's degree in physics from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and his PhD in physics from the University of California, Berkeley. This was followed by
a junior fellowship at Harvard University. He subsequently moved to Princeton University where he was eventually named Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics and Thomas Jones Professor of Mathematical Physics. In 1997 he became the Director of the Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics and has been the Frederick W Gluck Chair in Theoretical Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He has demonstrated that scientific leadership can co-exist with administrative stewardship.
From the mid-1980's onwards, prizes and awards landed on the good professor's lap almost every year. These honors, of which the Nobel Prize was the crowning glory, were international in scope. He was the recipient of the J J Sakurai Prize of the American Physical Society in 1986, the Dirac Medal from the International Center for Theoretical Physics in 1988, the Oscar Klein Medal of the Royal Swedish Academy in 2000, the Harvey Prize, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology 2000, the High Energy and Particle Physics Prize of the European Physical Society 2003, the Grande Medaille D'or de L'Academie des Sciences, France 2004, the Golden Plate Award, Academy of Achievement 2005 and the San Carlos Boromero Award, University of San Carlos, Philippines in 2008.
Similarly, he was almost yearly showered with honorary doctorates and honorary professorships beginning in 2000 from international universities such as Cambridge, Montpellier, Sao Paulo, Ohio State, and Zejiang and Xian among others. He served on scientific advisory boards and review committees too numerous to name.
Princeton University. It was an indirect tribute to this great teacher who believes in collaboration, preferring to involve his students in his on-going work rather than working in isolation. It was no doubt excellent training for his students. When Prof Gross won the Nobel Prize, it was as if he had won it twice over.
The scientific world is indebted to Prof Gross for helping to solve a cosmic puzzle -understanding the dynamics of universe that has been expanding since the big bang. Before his standard model, we mortals could not go back further than 200,000 years after the big bang. Thanks to Prof Gross we can now probe the universe to very early times. What's more, as Prof Gross himself says, one of the most important implications of asymptotic freedom is the insight it yields into the unification of all nature's forces, including gravity. It takes a large soul and a stupendous intellect to provide this theoretical unification.
Mr Pro-Chancellor, on behalf of the Council of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, I have the great honor to present to you Prof David J Gross, Director of the Institute for Theoretical Physics and holder of the Frederick W Gluck Chair in Theoretical Physics at the University of California, Santa Barbara for the award of Doctor of Science honoris causa.
But the one honor that has remained unnamed was that one of the other two co-recipients of his Nobel Prize in Physics was his graduate student at
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Professor David
J GROSS
Dear Mr Pro-Chancellor, Council Chairman, President Chu, Council and Court Members, fellow recipients, distinguished members of the faculties of the HKUST, parents, friends, and especially students; I am delighted to be here at this congregation, accept this honor and on behalf of all the recipients, address you briefly.
Many of you are completing your education today and are wondering what the next few years will bring. The one thing I am sure of is that no one, certainly not I can give you the answer. The world is undergoing rapid change, and as the events of the last few months show no one can predict what will happen next week, much less beyond that. The same is true of science, and of one's career in science. I received my PhD from the University of California at Berkeley 42 years ago, to begin a career in theoretical physics -
more specifically the study of the elementary particles and the fundamental forces of nature. The focus of attention then was the study of two of the four forces of nature, the two that operate within the nucleus, the weak force responsible for radioactivity and the strong force that holds the nuclei together. Little was understood; the strong force was especially mysterious. The prevalent feeling was that it would take a very long time to understand the strong force and that it would require revolutionary concepts. Freeman Dyson had asserted that "the correct theory will not be found in the next hundred years." For a young graduate student, such as myself, this was clearly the biggest challenge.
Little could I dream that, only seven years after I graduated, we would discover the secret of the strong force that binds quarks within the nucleus. This secret is the phenomenon we called asymptotic freedom, the fact that certain generalizations of electromagnetism, had the property that the force between charged particles would decrease at short distances - thus explaining the free behavior of quarks within nucleons at short distances-and conversely grow arbitrarily strong at large distances - thus
explaining why quarks cannot be pulled out of the proton. This led us to the beautiful theory that describes this force. It was this discovery and this theory, Quantum Chromodynamics or QCD that won us the Nobel Prize in Physics.
Life is made not of years but of moments. As we look back on our life what we remember is a collection of moments. None of us remember our beginning, and none will remember our end. Most other remembered moments that mark our years, are both endings and beginnings. This moment too, is both a beginning and an ending.
For many of you it is the end of college tuition and the beginning of repayment of student loans. For many of you it is the end of the process in which you absorb past knowledge and the beginning of the process where you begin to apply that knowledge or start to pass it on to the next generation. For many of you it is the end of formal education and the beginning of so-called real life. For many of you it is the end of the period in life where you receive from your parents and society
and the beginning of the period where you give back to society.
There is much that you can give back, for you are a privileged lot. You are privileged to be citizens of a rapidly growing country that is moving to take its rightful place in the world. You are fortunate to have lived free of the disease and hunger and war that plague much of humanity. You are privileged to have attended a great university and to have acquired much knowledge. You live better than kings and queens did only a few hundred years ago; you know more than the greatest scholars did, only a few generations ago.
But with all of these privileges comes the responsibility to use your knowledge to improve the lot of the less fortunate in our country and around the world, and to tackle the many problems and confront the many dangers that my generation has left for you to deal with. And there are many problems and dangers that we all face: the massive inequalities that exist in and among nations, the persistence of useless war and violence, the danger of fanaticism and terror, the threats to the environment and to the health of our planet.
The cause of many of these problems is sheer ignorance - the ignorance of the science that could solve many of the world's problems, the ignorance of basic facts - such as the fact
that all of us had a single mother only a few thousand generations ago - that make racism and bigotry still possible, and the ignorance of other cultures that promotes fanatical nationalism. As the possessors of the knowledge of the 21st century you have the responsibility to be forces for enlightenment and to strive to dispel this ignorance.
But ignorance is not all bad. Thomas Jefferson said: "Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong." The greatest obstacle to progress is not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge. The reason that the fundamentalists are so dangerous is not so much that they are ignorant but that they are certain that they possess the absolute truth. It is this certainty that can lead to repression, bigotry, racism, and fanaticism.
The main lesson of science is not the partial truth that we labor to reveal, but our attitude of skepticism towards these truths. We must always remain skeptical, always question our beliefs and confront them with nature.
And ignorance itself is not so bad. I often say that the most important product of knowledge is ignorance. Indeed, the driving force of science is the questions we ask, which are the embodiment of our ignorance.
As knowledge increases one might imagine that the pace of scientific discovery would slow as more and more questions are answered. But this has not turned out to be the case. As knowledge increases so does ignorance; the more we know, the more aware we are of what we know not. The questions we ask today are more profound and more interesting than those we asked years ago when I was a graduate student. Many of those we have answered. But back then we did not possess enough knowledge to be as intelligently ignorant as we are now, and therefore to ask the wonderful questions we ask today.
Among the questions we ask now are: How did the universe begin? How many dimensions of space are there? What unifies all the forces of nature,
what is the physical origin of consciousness, is the galaxy teeming with life, and more and more? Wonderful questions, most of which I believe will be answered in your lifetime - lucky you!
Some wonder whether some day we will arrive at a theory of everything and run out of new problems to solve, much as the effort to explore the earth ran out of new continents to explore. While this is conceivably possible, I am happy to report that there is no evidence that we are running out of our most important resource - ignorance.
Reporters often ask me: what advice would you give students embarking on a scientific career? I feel very uncomfortable answering such a question. Most of the advice I could give is self evident, or would consist of saying: Be like me if you want to succeed. But there are two pieces of advice that I do give all my students and which are applicable, I think, in all aspects of life. It is first: Follow your heart.
You will face many difficult choices in the years ahead
-
what career to follow, what field of science should you work in. When students ask me what field of science should they go into I always answer - find out what you truly love to do and, if possible, do that. I do not think that you can succeed unless you are engaged in what you truly love to do. If you are working in what you love to do than you will be able to marshal the concentration, creativity and hard work necessary for success. And, most important, you will enjoy the journey.Second: Aim high and dare to fail. If you never attempt goals that might appear to be impossible, you are guaranteed not to achieve these goals. If you try, you might very well fail. But so what! You might succeed and in any case you will know that you gave it your best shot and will have fun along the way, especially if you are engaged with what you love.
Take a chance to make a difference in all aspects of life; do not sell your dreams short. Do not be afraid to follow your most ambitious plans and to pursue your most outlandish ideas. Dare to connect with other human beings and to love deeply.
And if you do there will be many moments like this, moments of triumphant endings, moments of hopeful beginnings.
Thank you.
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Michael G Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching
Professor Mordecai J GOLIN
Citation
The Michael G Gale Medal for Distinguished Teaching was established by the University Council in 1994 to recognize an academic staff member who best exemplifies the continued pursuit of excellence, devotion to teaching and the ability to inspire and motivate.
Established by the University Council to commemorate the late Council Founding Member Michael G Gale for his outstanding contribution, this year the award goes to Prof Mordecai J Golin, a Computer Science and Engineering Professor and expert in the design and analysis of algorithms.
Prof Golin received his doctorate from Princeton University and joined the University in 1993. He is currently the Chair of the Senate Committee on Postgraduate Studies and his Department's 334 Conversion Committee. Twice voted by students as one of the Top Ten Best Lecturers, he is also a four-time recipient of the School of Engineering's Teaching Awards.
In teaching he favors a contextual approach. "I do not believe that technical subjects exist in a vacuum. To be properly understood, appreciated and remembered, they need to be placed within their proper sociopolitical context." Prof Golin often peppers his class with anecdotes to provide this context. Students find this approach intriguing. As related by one of his students, Prof Golin "always explains difficult concepts with interesting stories."
Apart from his contextual approach to pedagogy, Prof Golin impresses his students and colleagues with his unparalleled devotion to teaching and program development. His obsession with giving his students the best he can is almost contagious. During his career at HKUST he has created many new courses and developed both new Postgraduate and Undergraduate programs.
His current task is the development of the new Bachelor in Computer Science program which, for the first time, allows Computer Science students from the School of Engineering to also take a second concurrent major in a science subject, notably Mathematics or Physics. Due to the differing nature of the majors involved, Prof Golin has to work individually with students to develop personalized programs that match their own specific backgrounds, constraints and goals for the future.
Despite the work involved, Prof Golin finds the experience gratifying. "It is fascinating to build programs that work properly," remarked Prof Golin, "There's no greater pleasure than to see my students grow and develop intellectually and a well-designed program gives them that opportunity".
After all his time as an academic, Prof Golin remains passionate about his role as a teacher and convinced about the essence of education - that it is the task of helping students "learn, understand and grow. "
Stephen Cheong Kam-chuen Medal for Distinguished Service to the Student Body
LAU
Wai Kin
Andrew
Applied Physics, Year 3
The Stephen Cheong Kam-chuen Medal for Distinguished Service to the Student Body of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology was established by the University Council in 1993 in memory of the Honorable Stephen Cheong Kam-chuen, founding Council Member and distinguished public servant.
It is awarded to the student who best exemplifies the qualities of caring, constructive and dedicated leadership for which our late colleague is remembered.
We are pleased to present the Stephen Cheong Kam-chuen Medal for Distinguished Service to Lau Wai Kin Andrew.
In the absence of an elected executive committee in 2007-2008, the Students' Union Council formed a six-member provisional executive committee to take up the work of the Union. Mr Lau Wai Kin Andrew, a Year 1 Physics student, readily took up the post of Person-in-charge of the provisional executive committee. Andrew served well in this position, and under his leadership and dedicated effort, the normal functioning of the Union was sustained.
Andrew successfully engaged his fellow students in major issues of student concern. Together with other student representatives, Andrew actively participated in a review of the hall policy and the formulation of a new hall allocation system for undergraduate students
to take effect in 2008-2009. He also motivated student discussion on the plan to move student amenities to a new location in 2012 and drew up a layout proposal for the new space. Externally, he was active in promoting cultural exchange between UST students and those in other universities. He organized visits to universities in Chinese Mainland and Taiwan, and hosted visits by students from Singapore, the Mainland and Taiwan to our campus. As a result, the Union has strengthened its network with student leaders abroad.
President's Outstanding Service Award 2008
President's Outstanding Service Award
The bedrock of HKUST's academic success is the quality of its faculty and research staff. But perhaps not as well known is the caliber of its administrative and service staff members who have been providing the support to make this success possible. Collectively, they make the University a better place to live and work. The President's Outstanding Service Award was recently established by the University for the first time to recognize non-teaching staff members who have demonstrated exceptional service, dedication, and continued commitment to excellence in their work and who have contributed to making their work units function better and university life richer.
Today, we are pleased to present the inaugural President's Outstanding Service Award to the following three awardees. In alphabetical order, they are:
Mr
CHENG
Kit Ming Michael
Ms
WONG
Yuen Mei Anna
Senior Purchasing Manager in the Purchasing Office Clerk in the Office of University Development and Public Affairs
Michael is always around whenever you need help. He
has taken up requests way beyond his regular call of Anna is said to be "married to the job''. She has seldom dutv. He is a man who not onlv buvs what we need. , < had a proper lunch during her 14 years of service at but sets up what we please, from the Million Walk to HKUST spotting errors and catering to its media and the Dragon Boat Competition. Michael has given a lot editorial needs. Her work life is often a race against to the HKUST community and filled our campus with the clock. Anna can always be relied upon to help down-home warmth and feelings of fellowship. ensure the success of HKUST's public functions and social activities. She stands sentinel over the work of her unit.
Mr LAM Ping Wai Albert
Chief Technician in the Facilities Management Office
Albert leads a team of motivated staff and provides a quality of service that has a high impact on the university. He keeps the campus equipment and facilities humming and turns our wasteful habits into a passionate care for the environment. He has an abiding compassionate concern for the underprivileged. Albert is well known not only among staff members but also among student organizers as the "go-to" person whenever advice or assistance is needed.
President's Cup 2008
President's
Cup
As a young, dynamic and international university, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology has achieved excellence in education and research. To further enhance students' experience in learning, and to encourage creativity, the President's Cup was launched in 2002 as an annual event for undergraduate students to compete for the awards based on outstanding achievements in research and innovation.
There are four classes of awards, namely: President's Cup, Gold Award, Silver Award and Honorable Mention.
The 28 participating teams went through a vigorous selection, semi-final and final competitions with winners chosen by the Selection Committee of the University.
The awardees of the President's Cup, Gold Award and Silver Award are as follows:
Awards Winners Degree to be conferred Project title
President's Cup Kwan Kwok To BEng in Electronic Fully On-chip Charge Leung San Yiu Engineering Pump with Reversion
Loss Reduction Gold Award Xu Yi BEng in Electronic Humanoid Robot
Tsui Tsz Kwan Engineering Wong Tim Tat
Silver Award Hung Wing Chak* BEng in Chemical and Nanobottle-immobilized Siu Hin Man Bioproduct Engineering Biomolecules for
Tam Chun Yip Sensor Application Wah Kai Yee*
* Graduate o f Dual Degree Program in Technology and Management
