News

CEE Scholars’ Work on “A Smarter Radiative Cooler” Recommended by Science Editor’s Choice

Prof. Jian-Guo Dai’s research team, which includes Dr Xiao XUE, Research Fellow of Prof. Dai’s group, focuses on engineering inexpensive coating materials for buildings. It takes advantage of daytime radiative cooling but suppress it in the night when cooling no longer is needed. This is accomplished by widening the emissivity spectrum over the entire mid-infrared range. The strategy also uses common materials for the coatings that are more likely to withstand long-term weathering. Their work was recommended by Science Editor’s Choice. More details can be found at https://science.sciencemag.org/content/370/6522/twil.   

Best Student Presentation Award

Congratulations to two PhD students, Chang HE and Pin Zhang, for obtaining the “Best Student Presentation Award” during the 24th Annual Conference of HKSTAM 2020 and the 16th Shanghai – Hong Kong Forum on Mechanics and Its Application held on 5 Dec 2020. They are supervised by Dr Zhen-Yu Yin, Associate Professor of CEE.

New Joiner - Dr Chen Qianjie

Dr Chen, Qianjie - Research Assistant Professor Dr. Chen received a B.Sc. in Atmospheric Sciences from Sun Yat-sen University (2011), a M.Sc. in Meteorology, Physical Oceanography and Climate from Utrecht University (2013), and a Ph.D. in Atmospheric Sciences from University of Washington, Seattle (2017). Before joining us, he was a postdoctoral research fellow at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (2018-2020). Dr. Chen’s research resides in the field of atmospheric chemistry, the objective of which is to elucidate the abundances, sources, and sinks of the chemical species in the atmosphere. With the goal of addressing the chemistry aspects of global warming and air pollution issues facing the human race, Dr. Chen’s research interests include sulfur, nitrogen, and halogen chemistry in the lower atmosphere, and blowing snow in the Arctic. Dr. Chen was the selected Early Career Researcher Profile in the Cryosphere and Atmospheric Chemistry (CATCH) Open Science Workshop (2020), and the selected participant for the Atmospheric Chemistry Colloquium for Emerging Senior Scientists (ACCESS XV) (2019). He received the HHMI Teaching Postdoctoral Fellowship from University of Michigan (2018), Utrecht Excellence Scholarships and Buys Ballot Graduate Scholarships from Utrecht University (2011-2013).   Dr Chen has joined us on 7 December 2020.  

New Joiner - Dr Alireza Keramat

Dr Alireza Keramat - Research Assistant Professor   Dr Keramat obtained MSc and PhD degrees in Civil Engineering, majored in Hydraulic Structures, in 2006 and 2011 from Shahid Chamran University and Shahrood University of Technology, respectively. Affiliated as a faculty member in Civil Engineering Department of Jundi-Shapur University of Technology following his graduation, he taught several undergraduate and postgraduate courses and (co-) supervised/advised 14 MSc and 5 PhD students. He was a visiting scholar in Eindhoven University of Technology (2009-2010), visiting faculty member in Tokyo Institute of Technology (2014), Research Associate in Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (2016-2017) and visiting faculty member in the University of Alberta (2019-2020). His main research interests include: wave propagation, fluid-structure interaction, column separation, defect detection, non-Newtonian fluids, viscoelasticity and buckling in pipelines and pipe networks as well as their mathematical modelling and statistical analysis. Dr Alireza Keramat has joined us on 1 Dec 2020.

Entry Scholarships up to HK$50,000!

The Department has launched a new entry scholarship scheme for outstanding DSE students admitted to our undergraduate programmes via JUPAS in 2021/22. The scholarship amount is up to HK$50,000, which is more than a one-year tuition waiver. For details, please refer to https://www.polyu.edu.hk/cee/study/undergraduate-programmes/jupas-applicants/.

PhD student awarded Student Scholarship

PhD student awarded Student Scholarship A PhD student, Qian, Jing, was awarded the Student Scholarship during the 7th International Symposium on Reliability and Engineering and Risk Management (ISRERM2020). Only three papers were selected for the scholarship, according to the judges based on their presentations. Congratulations!

Three CEE Scholars named “Highly Cited Researchers 2020"

Three CEE Scholars named “Highly Cited Researchers 2020” Congratulations to Prof. Kwok-Wing Chau (Engineering), Prof. Shun-cheng Lee (Cross-Field) and Dr Daniel CW Tsang (Environment/Ecology) for being listed as Highly Cited Researcher 2020 by Clarivate Analytics. It identifies researchers who have demonstrated significant and broad influence in their fields over the last decade, demonstrated by the production of multiple highly-cited papers that rank in the top 1% by citations for field and year in the Web of Science™. Of the world’s scientists and social scientists, Clarivate™ Highly Cited Researchers are truly one in 1,000. This is definitely a recognition to their high quality publication and scientific impact in the fields.   Prof. Kwok-Wing Chau was awarded a BSc in civil engineering with First Class Honours from the University of Hong Kong, an MSc in civil engineering with distinction from the University of Hong Kong, and a PhD from the University of Queensland in Australia.  He is very active in undertaking research works and the scope of his research interests is very broad, covering numerical flow modeling, water quality modeling, hydrological modeling, knowledge-based system development and artificial intelligence applications. Prof. Chau has published over 250 Science Citation Index journal papers and the total number of non-self citations is over 10,000. He acquired many prestigious research awards: 2008 Natural Science Class 1 Award conferred by Ministry of Education in China, 2009 Dean’s Award for Outstanding Publication Achievement (Overall performance in citation in the past 10 years), 2009 National Natural Science Class 2 Award, Dean’s Awards for Outstanding Publication Achievement (Highly-cited papers) in various years, and 2018 – 2020 Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate Analytics.   Prof. Shun-cheng Lee earned a Doctorate in Environmental Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley in 1994. His research focus includes chemical characteristics, sources, vehicle emission profiles, indoor cooking, carbon aerosols, and toxic gaseous pollutants. He has completed the comprehensive emission inventory and source emission profiles of vehicles, cooking, ships, and household cleaners in Hong Kong. He has published 308 papers in the international journals, being cited by SCI in total of 19,161 times (h-index: 78). He was awarded as Highly Cited Researcher (cross-field) by Clarivate in 2018 – 2020. In 2019, he was awarded as Fellow of Asian Aerosol Research Assembly (AARA).  Prof. Lee is the Associate Head and Odour Lab In Charge at the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering of PolyU.     Dr Daniel CW Tsang is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and Honorary Associate Professor at the University of Queensland in Australia. He was Visiting Scholar at Ghent University in Belgium and Stanford University in the US, Senior Lecturer at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand, and Post-doctoral Fellow at Imperial College London in the UK. Dan’s research group strives to develop low-carbon solutions to ensure sustainable development and circular economy. Dan has published over 400 research articles in top 10% journals (54 highly cited papers, 4 hot papers, 10000+ citations) and served as Associate Editor and Editorial Board Member of various environmental science and engineering journals. Dan is the Chair and Organizer of many international conferences such as 5th Asia Pacific Biochar Conference (APBC2021).  

New Patent Certificate issued by CNIPA

Congratulations to Prof. Yi-Qing Ni and members of Hong Kong Branch of National Rail Transit Electrification and Automation Engineering Technology Research Center (CNERC-Rail) for receiving a patent certificate issued by National Intellectual Property Administration, PRC, together with National Central University and Sheng Wei Science Co. LTD. The new Chinese patent is called “一种光纤布拉格光栅角度传感器”. More details of the patent can be found here.     

Four CEE research projects awarded funding in NSFC/RGC Joint Research Scheme 2020/21

In 2020/21 Exercise of the National Natural Science Foundation of China/Research Grants Council (NSFC/RGC) Joint Research Scheme, the RGC and NSFC have agreed to fund a total of 30 research projects, out of 213 eligible applications, for a total sum of HK$34.7 million. PolyU submitted 48 preliminary proposals and 16 full proposals, of which 10 full proposals are successful with a total awarded amount of HK$11.571 million (i.e., 33.35% of total awarded funding) and four of them are from CEE Department.   This is the best funding results in NSFC/RGC Joint Research Scheme attained by PolyU since the implementation of this funding scheme. PolyU has also attained the largest number of funded projects and grant amount among UGC-funded universities in 2020/21 Exercise.   Congratulations to PolyU and CEE Principal Investigator and research team of the following projects!   Principle Investigator Project Title Funding Period (months) Amount Awarded by RGC (HK$) Prof. Hai Guo Organic Aerosols in Offshore Marine Atmosphere of Eastern and Southern China: Sources, Chemical Ageing, and Climate Consequence 48     1,154,954   Dr Zhen-Yu Yin Study of Multi-Physics Coupling Mechanism of Deep Sea Pipeline and Soft Marine Organic Deposits Interaction Considering Time and Temperature Effects 48 1,154,954 Prof. Jian-Guo Dai Research and Development on Waste Ash/Slag-based Artificial Aggregates for Applications in Concrete 48 1,154,954 Prof. Kwok-Fai Chung Research on Structural Behaviour of Stainless-Clad Bi-Metallic Steel Welded Connections and Joints under Monotonic and Cyclic Actions 48 1,158,329

Chair Prof Series - Nov

Last two lectures of the Chair Professor Series: Online Lecture were successfully held. Similar to the past lectures, Prof. Poon and Prof. Wang’s sessions also received high enrollment. Great thanks to all Chair Professors for their contribution and all attendees for their active participation.  If you failed to register or would like to revisit them, please refer to https://www.polyu.edu.hk/cee/news-and-events/useful-links-for-current-student/seminars-talks/.