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HKU Professor Kenneth Leung conferred as a Fellow of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC)

16 Nov 2017

Professor Kenneth Leung Mei-yee of the Swire Institute of Marine Science and School of Biological Sciences of the University of Hong Kong.

On 12 November 2017, Professor Kenneth Leung Mei-yee of the Swire Institute of Marine Science and School of Biological Sciences of the University of Hong Kong (HKU) has been conferred as a Fellow of the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) which currently has about 6500 professional members from over 100 countries.  

The conferment of SETAC Fellow status aims to recognize excellence and contributions of SETAC members to ecotoxicology, environmental chemistry, risk assessment and/or life cycle assessment.  The appointed SETAC Fellows shall demonstrate both (i) significant long-term scientific or science policy contributions and (ii) service and leadership within SETAC.  No more than 2% of the memberships of SETAC hold this prestigious recognition.  In this year, there are a total of seven new Fellows being appointed by SETAC, and their names have been announced at the Opening Ceremony of the SETAC North America 38^th Annual Meeting, held on 12 November 2017 at Minneapolis in the United States.  Up to now, there are only 57 SETAC Fellows around the world. 

Professor Leung will receive a certificate and a pin, and will be officially acknowledged at the Annual Meeting of SETAC Asia Pacific Geographic Unit to be held in Daegu, Korea during 16-19 September 2018.

Dr. Patrick Guiney, the Chairman of the 2017 SETAC Fellows Nomination Committee, was very pleased to announce that the nomination of Professor Kenneth Leung as a SETAC Fellow was unanimously approved by the Nominations Committee, the Global Awards Committee, and the SETAC World Council.  Dr. Guiney also added “Professor Leung’s life-time achievements and service to SETAC captured in an exceptional way with the many scientific and policy-related successes that he has achieved.  These achievements will have had a long-term impact on the way people think about and practice environmental toxicology and chemistry”.

Professor Kurt Maier, the current President of SETAC World Council, congratulated Professor Leung on being selected as a SETAC Fellow, and said “It was an easy decision for the Committee as Professor Leung was clearly deserving.”

As a Swire Scholar, Professor Kenneth Leung obtained his PhD in marine ecotoxicology from University of Glasgow in 2000.  Being a Croucher Postdoctoral Research Fellow, he received further research training in environmental risk assessment of chemical contaminants at Royal Holloway, University of London.   So far, he has published six edited volumes and over 180 peer-reviewed articles which are principally related to marine ecology, pollution monitoring, ecotoxicology, environmental risk assessment, marine resource management, and eco-shoreline engineering.  As indicated by the Essential Science Indicators, Professor Leung is among the top 1% cited scholars in the field of Ecology/Environmental Science in the world.  He is an editor-in-chief of the Elsevier journal, Regional Studies in Marine Science, and a subject editor for the Wiley journal, Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management and the Springer journal, Environmental Science and Pollution Research.  During 2010–2012, he was the elected President of the SETAC Asia Pacific Geographic Unit.  Currently, he serves as chairman of the Marine Parks Committee, Marine Mammal Conservation Working Group, and Fisheries Enhancement Fund Management Committee, as well as member of the Advisory Council on the Environment, and Advisory Council on Food and Environmental Hygiene for the Hong Kong SAR Government.  Owing to his professional achievements and community services, he was selected as one of the “Ten Outstanding Young Persons” for Hong Kong by Junior Chamber International in 2010 and awarded the “19^th Biwako Prize for Ecology” by the Ecological Society of Japan in 2017.

For more details about the SETAC Fellows Award, please visit: https://www.setac.org/?page=setacfellows   

For media enquiries, please contact Ms Cindy Chan, Senior Communication Manager of Faculty of Science (Tel: 3917 5286/ 6703 0212; Email: cindycst@hku.hk) or Professor Kenneth Leung by email at kmyleung@hku.hk.

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