Daniel Elkin listed among PolyU Young Innovative Researchers 2022

Congratulations to Mr Daniel Elkin, Assistant Professor of PolyU Design on winning PolyU Young Innovative Researcher Award (YIRA) 2022!

The Award is received for his research project 'Pedestrian traffic monitoring, 3D stilt house scanning for Tai O Village revitalization'. It is a collaborative initiative of PolyU Design and Department of Applied Social Sciences partnered with the Tai O Village Rural Committee and various community groups to collect pedestrian traffic flow data in Tai O Village in Hong Kong. It monitors pedestrian traffic into the Village using infrared passage gates installed in eight major infrastructure connections. 

The inaugural YIRA is established to honour young PolyU researchers under the age of 35 who have demonstrated novelty, contributed to technology advancement, and propelled transformational innovation into solutions for addressing problems in society with a vision for a positive change to the future. With this award, the University not only wishes to recognise the potential innovation, but to encourage and nurture a positive spirit of novelty within PolyU that will benefit the future.


This year, the organiser received overwhelming responses with 59 submissions across 22 departments covering all faculties/schools. The YIRA assessment panel, composed of Prof. Jin-Guang Teng (P), Prof. Wing-tak Wong (DP), Dr Miranda Lou (EVP), Prof. Christopher Chao (VPRI) and Prof. Larry Chow (DoRI), has reviewed the submissions, interviewed shortlisted applicants and selected six YIRA awardees. Each awardee will receive research funding support of HK$500,000 and personal cash prize of HK$20,000 as the encouragement for their research novelty and impact.