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Nine HKU academics named amongst the world's most highly cited researchers

02 Oct 2015

 

Professor Peter Mathieson, the President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Hong Kong (HKU), issued a message on behalf of the Senior Management Team to all members of the University today to congratulate nine outstanding HKU academics named amongst the world’s most highly cited researchers 2015 and all the colleagues in their research team that have contributed to the success.

Nine academics of HKU have been named by Thomson Reuters in the list of “Highly Cited Researchers 2015” among the world’s top researchers whose work have been highly cited by fellow academics and are hence making a significant impact in ongoing research in their respective fields of study. In 2014, a total of five (5) HKU researchers were on the list.

According to Thomson Reuters, “Highly Cited Researchers 2015” represents some of the world’s most influential scientific minds. About 3,000 researchers in 21 fields of the sciences and social sciences earned this distinction by writing the greatest number of reports officially designated by Essential Science Indicators as Highly Cited Papers — ranking among the top 1% most cited for their subject field and year of publication, earning them the mark of exceptional impact.

The determination of how many researchers to include in the list for each field was based on the population of each field, as represented by the number of author names appearing on all Highly Cited Papers in that field, 2003-2013. As the assessment period is 11 years, the methodology is objective and these data can be considered more robust than the standard league tables which depend upon subjective assessments and annual data gathering with frequent methodological changes.

Professor Peter Mathieson was delighted with the findings. He said: “It is a timely opportunity to reassure all academic staff of the University that HKU continues to be a place where academic freedom is cherished and protected, where academic staff are encouraged to pursue whatever subjects their interests dictate, irrespective of how controversial they may be, and that all assessments of credentials and performance will be based on academic merit according to internationally recognised standards. Despite recent controversies, the University is striding forward and I am very optimistic that the future is bright.”

The HKU academics featured in “Highly Cited Researchers 2015” are:

Category: Agricultural Sciences

Professor Nagendra P. Shah

Professor of Food Science and Technology

Discipline Leader, Food and Nutritional Sciences

School of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science

Professor Nagendra P. Shah has a long and intensive research history in probiotics, prebiotics and functional foods that has led to a distinguished international reputation in this area. He has published 244 research papers, 27 book chapters, and 209 conference abstracts. Additionally, he has edited 2 books on Dairy Products and Quality Control, and Probiotic and Prebiotic. He has also edited 2 special issues of the International Dairy Journal. His work has been highly cited in peer-reviewed journals. Prof. Shah has received several prestigious international awards and accolades for his contributions to research. According to Google Scholar, Prof. Shah has received 11,706 citations and his h-index is 54.

Website:www.biosch.hku.hk/staff/nps/nps.html

Category: Computer Science / Engineering

Professor James Lam

Chair Professor of Control Engineering

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering

Professor Lam received a BSc (1st Hons.) degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Manchester, and the MPhil and PhD degrees from the University of Cambridge. He is a Croucher Scholar and Fellow, and is a recipient of the Outstanding Researcher Award of the University of Hong Kong. Professor Lam is Fellow of Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, Fellow of Institution of Engineering and Technology, Fellow of Institute of Mathematics and Its Applications, and Fellow of Institution of Mechanical Engineers. He is Editor-in-Chief of IET Control Theory and Applications and Journal of The Franklin Institute.

Website: http://web.hku.hk/~jlam

Category: Geosciences

Professor Sun Min

Department of Earth Sciences, Faculty of Science

Professor Sun received his B. Sc. Degree from Peking University, China in 1982, and then received M Sc and Ph D degree from the University of British Columbia, Canada in 1985 and 1990. His expertise is to work on sophisticated geochemical instrument and to utilize chemical and isotope data to solve outstanding scientific problems in earth sciences. He joined the University of Hong Kong in 1994 and has been working on a large number of research projects on early history of the earth, geological evolution of North and South China cratons, accretionary history of Central Asia, and paleoclimate study using coral chemistry.

He received a collaborative research award for Outstanding Young Researchers from the National Natural Science Foundation of China in 1999, an Outstanding Yong Researcher Award from HKU in 2001, and a Natural Science Prize (Second Class) from China in 2014. His the Hong Kong director of the Joint Chemical Geodynamics Laboratory with Chinese Academy of Science, and co-leader of International Geoscience Programme Project 592.

Website: http://www.earthsciences.hku.hk/people/academic-staff/prof-sun-min

Professor Zhao Guochun

Department of Earth Sciences, Faculty of Science

Prof. Guochun Zhao is a full-time Professor at University of Hong Kong. His major findings include discoveries of two 1.95-1.85 billion years (Ga) old collisional belts in North China, and the first proposal of global scale 2.0-1.8 Ga collisional events leading to the assembly of a supercontinent. According to the Web of Knowledge, Prof. Zhao’s record in the field of GEOSCIENCES includes 260 papers cited by others for 14,000 times (h-index = 72), ranking No. 7 among 3164 top 1% geoscientists. Prof. Guochun Zhao is the Editor-in-Chief of Precambrian Research, and as the first awardee, he won The State Natural Science Award (Second Class) in 2014. Also in 2014, he was elected to be the Fellow of GSA and the President of the International Association of Gondwana Research.

Website: http://www.earthsciences.hku.hk/people/academic-staff/prof-zhao-g-c

Category: Microbiology

Dr Chan Kwok-hung

Assistant Professor

Department of Microbiology, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine

Dr Chan Kwok-hung received his Ph.D (Microbiology) in 1995 from the University of Hong Kong.  Now he is the Assistant Professor in the Department of Microbiology, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, HKU.  Dr Chan’s team works on rapid diagnosis and epidemiology study of respiratory virus infection.  Currently, his work focuses on pathogenesis, immunology and antiviral agents against emerging infectious diseases including SARS coronavirus, MERS coronavirus and avian influenza.  He has made significant contributions in these areas as evidenced by his publications in Nature Medicine, New England Journal of Medicine, Nature Genetics, Proceedings of the National Academy Sciences (USA), Lancet and Nature Communications.

Professor Guan Yi

Daniel CK Yu Professor in Virology

Professor of School of Public Health

Director of State Key Laboratory of Emerging Infectious Diseases

Director of Centre of Influenza Research

Co-Director of the WHO H5 Reference Laboratory

Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine

Professor Guan’s research focuses on the ecology, evolution and pathogenesis of influenza and other emerging respiratory viruses. Over the past decade, his research team has made distinguished contributions to research in virology and to the control of emerging infectious diseases in China and the world. His studies identified the zoonotic source of the SARS coronavirus and the major precursors and evolutionary pathways of the H5N1, 2009 pandemic and H7N9 influenza viruses, leading to measures to avert and control these major human disease outbreaks. His contribution to the field is reflected in his publication record of over 300 peer-reviewed articles with >27,500 citations and an h-index of 82.

Professor Joseph S Malik Peiris

Tam Wah-Ching Professor in Medical Science

Chair Professor and Director of School of Public Health, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine

Professor Peiris is a clinical and public health virologist with a particular interest in emerging virus disease at the animal-human interface including influenza, coronaviruses (SARS, MERS) and others.  His current research encompasses the pathogenesis, innate immune responses, transmission, ecology and epidemiology of human and animal (poultry, swine, wild birds) influenza viruses.  Currently he is researching the recently emerged MERS coronavirus.

He co-directs the WHO H5 Reference Laboratory at HKU and serves on many standing committees and ad-hoc advisory committees of the WHO and FAO.  He was awarded Silver Bauhinia Star (S.B.S.), Hong Kong SAR in 2008. 

Website: http://sph.hku.hk/en/about-us/faculty-and-staff/academic-staff/peiris,-joseph-sriyal-malik

Dr Leo Poon Lit-man

Associate Professor

School of Public Health, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine

Dr Poon has strong interests that are related to emerging viruses, ranging from studying basic biology of RNA viruses to developing molecular diagnostic tools for infectious diseases.  His work primarily focuses on influenza virus and coronavirus.  Dr Poon involves in influenza research for over 18 years.  He studied the replication and pathogenesis of this virus.  He developed several molecular tests for emerging avian influenza viruses (e.g. H5N1, pandemic H1N1/2009 and H7N9).  Currently, he focuses on researching the viral replication and vaccinology of influenza virus.

Website: http://sph.hku.hk/en/about-us/faculty-and-staff/academic-staff/poon,-lit-man-leo

Professor Yuen Kwok-yung

Henry Fok Professor in Infectious Diseases

Chair Professor of Infectious Diseases

Department of Microbiology, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine

Professor Yuen is the Director of State Key Laboratory of Emerging Infectious Diseases at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) and the Chief of Service of the department of microbiology at Queen Mary hospital.  He has discovered over 60 novel viruses, bacteria, fungi or parasitic species, many of which are named after HKU or Hong Kong. He played a key role in the discovery of the agent causing SARS, the SARS coronavirus, thus leading to measures that were crucial to containing the SARS outbreak.  The HKSAR government has honoured his contributions with the award of a Silver Bauhinia Star in 2004. He was elected to the Chinese Academy of Engineering (Basic Medicine) in 2007.

He is one of the world’s most highly cited researchers in the field of microbiology, as ranked by the Essential Science Indicator (ISI web), and has published more than 750 papers in international peer reviewed journals, with over 25,000 citations.  His field of interest is novel microbes in emerging infectious disease outbreaks.

For more information about Highly Cited Researcher2015, please visit http://highlycited.com/

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