Paul Chu
President of HKUST;
US National Medal of Science recipient

Professor Paul C. W. Chu is the President of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). He is also the Executive Director of Texas Center for Superconductivity and the T. L. L. Temple Chair of Science at the University of Houston. He was born in Hunan, China, and received his B.S. degree from Cheng-Kung University in Taiwan, an M.S. degree from Fordham University NY, and a Ph.D. degree from the University of California at San Diego.

Professor Chu had conducted industrial research at Bell Laboratories at Murray Hill, New Jersey before he held academic appointments at Cleveland State University and the University of Houston. He also served as consultant and visiting staff member at various national and industrial laboratories.

After assuming the presidency of HKUST in 2001, Professor Chu has set out to further raise the profile of the University internationally. In June 2005, Prof Chu launched the HKUST Strategic Plan 2005-2020 which envisions the development of HKUST into one of the world's academic leaders in five academic fields, namely nano-science and nano-technology, biological sciences and biotechnology, electronics, wireless and information technology, sustainable development and energy, as well as management education and research.

Professor Chu has been instrumental in expanding HKUST's partnership with the Government and the region's industries. Several major institutes have been established under the sponsorship of the Government and the private sector, with the R&D Center for Nanotechnology and Advanced Materials, a $400 million initiative, being the latest example of the successful partnership.

Professor Chu remains actively engaged in the basic and applied research of high temperature superconductivity. In January 1987, he and his colleagues achieved stable superconductivity at 93 K (-180°C) above the critical temperature of liquid nitrogen (-196°C), a major advancement in modern science. Later, they again obtained stable superconductivity at a new record high temperature of 164 K (-109°C) in another compound when it was compressed.

How Computers Help a Computer Illiterate Physicist?

As an experimental physicist, I have used computers extensively dealing with data collection and model simulation. While we can hardly perform our research without computers, there are also occasions when we find them not as user friendly as we hope. In some situations, we have to learn how to adapt to computers, not computers adapt to us. Data centric computing seems to give some light in this direction. In this talk, I will share with you my experience in using computers and what I expect from my future dream computers.