Achievements

Our research paper about “Optical 3D patterning of PAA ionic hydrogels” published in a top journal: Advanced Materials

The Department is pleased to share with you that our research paper about “Optical 3D patterning of PAA ionic hydrogels” has been published in a top journal: Advanced Materials! This is highlighted by Materials Views China.   More details click here

Engineering Club is the Second Runner-up in The IET/MATE Hong Kong Underwater Robot Challenge 2016

The IET/MATE Underwater robot competition was held on 16-17 April and our team with 20 students from EE, ME, COMP and ABCT, designed a brand new underwater ROV for this event. With experience gained from last year’s competition, students designed a new ROV which is smaller in size and lighter in weight but more maneuverable due to the thrusters’ arrangement.  The ROV was built by the students, with ME students building the robotic arm, Computing students development the control software. EE students are responsible for building the frame, buoyancy system, electronic and project management.  After months of hard work, the ROV was finally completed one week before the competition. The team encountered many technical issues during the test run and the ROV broke down after the trial-run on the first day of the competition. But the students worked around the clock and repaired the ROV. On the second day of the competition, the team first passed the qualification test allowing the team to take part in the International competition in June and then completed the ROV competition which included the technical presentation as well as achieving various tasks underwater. Finally, we came third in the competition.  The team is now working on a new design and planning to develop another ROV to participate in the International Competition to be held in NASA Johnson Space Center’s Neutral Buoyancy Lab. 

Congratulations to Dr Alan Lau! PolyU breaks the world record of fastest optical communications for data centres!

The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) has achieved the world's fastest optical communications speed for data centres by reaching 240 G bit/s over 2km, 24 times of the existing speed available in the market. Compared to existing alternatives in the market, the technology developed by PolyU has reduced the cost of data transmission per unit to just one-fourth, and therefore is practical for commercialisation purposes. Speedy transmission at a significantly low cost for data centres enables end users to widely use new forms of communications such as immersive videos, augmented reality and virtual reality. On a societal level, the increased transmission speed will open up a new era for Big Data and Internet of Things (IoT) applications, driving innovation and technology advancement.  [More details]

Seoul international invention fair 2015 - Gold prize

The recent development in body-integrated super-capacitor technology for the Next Generation of Electric Vehicles has been received the Gold Prize of the Seoul International Invention Fair.  Prof Eric Cheng of Dept. of Electrical Engineering is the principal investigator of the technology and he leads the team for the development work.  He also received the certificate of Excellent Achievement from the Malaysian Association of Research Scientists (MARS) .  A number of technologies including packaging, balancing, management, safety and communication have been developed.   

Awards Received in Leading International Conference on Optical Fiber Sensors

Date: 28 September to 2 October 2015 EE research students Mr. Fan Yang and Miss Yanzhen Tan received Best Student Paper Award and Best Paper Award respectively at 24th International Conference on Optical Fiber Sensors (OFS-24) held on 28 Sept to 2 Oct 2015 in Curitiba, Brazil. The winning papers are entitled “Photothermal effect in gas-filled hollow-core photonic bandgap fiber” and “All-fiber photoacoustic gas sensor with graphene nano-mechanical resonator as acoustic detector”. Their PhD supervisor, Prof. Wei Jin, was also honored Best Supervisor Award in the same conference. OFS is acknowledged as the world’s leading conference on all topics related to photonic sensing technologies. OFS-24 hosted more than 400 participants from over 29 countries. The conference series is held every eighteen months, in rotation between America, Europe and Asia/Oceania since 1983. It provides a vibrant forum for reporting the latest advances in fiber-optic and photonic sensing technologies and related devices. The OFS awards are established to recognize the best works on sensing by using light in general and, in particular, by using optical fiber approaches. In addition, they also recognize researchers whose actions and works have remarkably contributed to the advance of the knowledge within the OFS sensing community.

Achievements in an International Underwater Robotics Competition

Date: June 2015 Venue: St Johns’ Newfoundland of Canada   A team of 10 comprises 8 EE, 1 TSE and 1 ME student participated in the MATE 2015 Underwater Robotics Competition which was held in St Johns’ Newfoundland of Canada in June 2015.  To prepare for this International competition, a brand-new underwater robot equipped with powerful and advanced onboard microcomputer and thrusters was built. During the 3-day competition, our underwater robot was required to perform different tasks inside an ice tank and a wave tank.  There are many other assessment criteria e.g. presentation and reporting etc. that need the whole team to work wholeheartedly together.  The whole process is very challenging and full of fun!  We are also very excited to learn that our team ranked 12 out of 26 in such a big international competition!  To strive for a better result, we now target to start our preparation in the coming September.  If you want to join this team for the 2016 competition in NASA Johnson Space Center, Houston, Texas, USA, please contact Dr Isaac Fung yu-fai.fung@polyu.edu.hk

International Berthold Leibinger Innovationspreis award 2014 in Germany

Date: 26th September 2014   Congratulations to Prof. H.Y. Tam, Prof. S.L. Ho and Dr. Michael Liu for winning the third prize of the Berthold Leibinger Innovationspreis 2014 at the award ceremony on 26th September 2014 in Ditzingen, Germany.   “I am very glad to be granted this great honour as it is one of the highest remunerated international innovation prizes for laser technology.  It is a humbling experience to be following the footsteps of eminent scientists including Prof. Dr. Stephen (the Novel Prize awardee for Chemistry 2014) who had previously won this prize. I wish to thank my dedicated teammates who have worked with me over the last 10 years in turning the dream of laser based sensors for railway monitoring to a reality.” Prof. Tam remarked.    The Berthold Leibinger Innovationspreis honors scientists and developers who make advancements in the field of laser technology.  Since 2000, the Berthold Leibinger Stiftung has given the award every two years for excellent research and development work on the application or generation of laser light.   A total of 30 and the applications and nominations from around the world participate in this year competition.  The selected eight finalists had the opportunity to present to the jurors their research and development, market success and expectations of their innovations and the jury in the end decided the prize winners for this year.

CLP's Engineering Studies Award 2014

The Department is pleased to share with you that two out of the four winners of this year’s CLP Engineering Studies Award (ESA) are PolyU EE students!  The EE winners are Mr. Chu Wing Keung Ken (BEng in EE) and Mr. Man Tsun Yin Herman (DD in EE)!