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21 Sep 2020

Three CUHK Researchers Receive China’s Excellent Young Scientists Fund 2020

21 Sep 2020
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Prof. LI Man Chun Martin, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics.

Prof. ZHAO Ni, Professor, Department of Electronic Engineering.

Prof. CHOW Hei Man Kim, Assistant Professor, School of Life Sciences.

Three young researchers from The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) have been awarded China’s Excellent Young Scientists Fund 2020. Each of them will receive a funding of RMB1.2 million to directly support their scientific research projects in Hong Kong to a maximum period of three years.

Access to the funding was first extended to Hong Kong and Macau in 2019, allowing young scientists from the two Special Administrative Regions who have demonstrated achievements in basic research to further conduct research in areas of their own choice, fostering talent development in academics.

The three CUHK young researchers and their projects:

Theme

Researcher

Project Description

Geometric analysis

Prof. LI Man Chun Martin, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics

Prof. LI has achieved substantial progress towards establishing the existence and geometric/analytic properties of minimal surfaces, in particular in cases with boundaries. Based on the established foundational work, Prof. LI will continue to pursue further development in the theory of minimal surfaces with boundary. Apart from more detailed study of min-max theory, geometric flows and geometric partial differential equations, he will also explore new applications in three-dimensional topology, conformal geometry and calibrated geometry.

Material sciences and biomedical applications of optoelectronic devices

Prof. ZHAO Ni, Professor, Department of Electronic Engineering

Prof. ZHAO has been developing scientific approaches to reveal the structure-property correlations in organic, hybrid, and nanostructured composite semiconductors, and applying the fundamental findings to the development of practical optoelectronic and biomedical devices. In the proposed research, Prof. ZHAO aims to establish a multidisciplinary research area that focuses on integration of organic and perovskite-based device technologies to enable a compact, low-cost and accurate sensor platform for continuous monitoring of vital signs and early detection and classification of cardiopulmonary disorders.

Metabolic reprogramming mechanism and regulation in cerebellar ataxia

Prof. CHOW Hei Man Kim, Assistant Professor, School of Life Sciences

Pathologically, ataxia is resulted from cerebellar Purkinje neuron atrophy and degeneration. Prof. CHOW will perform integrated metabolomic and transcriptomic analyses, to better understand the underlying mechanisms of such metabolic reprogramming observed. She will also test on the feasibility of both the precision medicine-nutrition approach, as well as the latest autologous mitochondria transplantation technology in ATM-deficient neurons. This is in hope to understand the effectiveness of these new approaches. Once they are proved successful, the findings can be readily adopted in a clinical setting in a tangible and inexpensive manner, and set as an example of personalized therapies in the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders, for future reference.

 



Prof. LI Man Chun Martin, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics.

Prof. LI Man Chun Martin, Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics.

 

Prof. ZHAO Ni, Professor, Department of Electronic Engineering.

Prof. ZHAO Ni, Professor, Department of Electronic Engineering.

 

Prof. CHOW Hei Man Kim, Assistant Professor, School of Life Sciences.

Prof. CHOW Hei Man Kim, Assistant Professor, School of Life Sciences.

 

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