News & Stories

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) has achieved research breakthrough with a novel approach, using ultrathin lead nanowires to produce magnetic fields which are 200 times stronger and increase the temperature of the environment in which superconductors operate. The research, providing solutions to a bottleneck unsolved for over a century concerning low applications of superconductors due to ultra low temperatures and low magnetic critical fields required, is envisaged to greatly enhance superconductor-based technologies to facilitate their applications in medical and biological fields such as high-resolution Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) devices for cancer and stroke detection. The breakthrough research is published in the prestigious nanoscience and technology journal ACS Nano..

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) received a five-million-dollar donation from Dr Simon Kwok and Dr Eleanor Kwok for the development of bio-devices for treatment of endoluminal diseases. These groundbreaking inventions, developed with an aim to improving stroke treatments, are the fruits of close collaboration between leading neurosurgeons and the engineering faculty at HKUST. The successful collaboration points a new way forward for the medical practitioners and the engineering academics to collaboratively develop frontier medical technologies in Hong Kong.

Prof Zhenguo Wu of the Division of Life Science at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) and his research team have discovered a novel protein Pax3/7BP that plays an influential role in skeletal muscle stem cells. This groundbreaking discovery could lead to more effective stem cell treatments for various muscle diseases including muscular dystrophy. Skeletal muscle stem cells function differently at different developmental stages. They are responsible for normal skeletal muscle growth in young animals including humans and for injury-induced muscle regeneration in adult animals. In skeletal muscle tissues, Pax7 is a protein that is uniquely present in muscle stem cells and is indispensable for muscle stem cell functions in young animals. However, until recently how Pax7 regulates the functions of muscle stem cells had remained unclear.

A research publication by Prof Zikang Tang and Prof George Wong both of the Department of Physics at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) titled ‘Room-temperature ultraviolet laser emission from self-assembled ZnO microcrystallite thin films’ was recognized to be amongst the top 50 most cited papers over the past 50 years in Applied Physics Letters, one of the world’s most esteemed scientific journals. This is also the only research developed in Greater China region that made it into the top 50. Prof Tang, Prof Wong and their research team discovered room-temperature ultraviolet (UV) lasing using high-quality nano-structured ZnO semiconductors in 1998, defying the norm that for decades, UV lasing of ZnO could only be observed at low temperatures. The groundbreaking discovery has opened up a wide range of potential applications for ZnO semiconductors in UV laser diodes as well as energy-saving semiconductor white light sources.

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) and HP today announced breakthroughs regarding their collaboration to advance networking and information analytics technology. New innovations include a wireless multi-hop network which provided wider bandwidth coverage range, as well as an information analytics solution with a new probabilistic approach. HKUST and HP have also been working together to explore innovative approaches to promote education in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) through the HP Catalyst Initiative. HKUST is the only Hong Kong institution to receive two awards as part of the fourth annual HP Labs Innovation Research Program (IRP) in September 2011. The program has created opportunities for faculty members and students at leading tertiary institutions worldwide to conduct breakthrough research with HP. HKUST’s projects are two of 62 selected from 626 proposals from 525 researchers.

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) has achieved yet another milestone in molecular neuroscience research. Prof Nancy Ip, Dean of Science and Director of the State Key Laboratory of Molecular Neuroscience at HKUST, and her research team have made breakthrough discoveries in signaling mechanisms in brain development that have far-reaching implications for biomedicine. These groundbreaking discoveries by Prof Ip and her research team have been published in Nature Neuroscience, a prestigious journal in neuroscience.