Dr Plastic's unbending ambition to invent a better world for all

Award-winning materials scientist Steve Chum Pak-wing believes there are two important qualifications successful scientists should have: the talent to improve people's living standards and the ability to make money.

'As a scientist you have to work on science and technologies that will make profits,' the Macau-born scientist in plastic and chemistry said. 'You have to also focus ... on improving the lives of human beings. If you put them all together, you'll be successful.'

Dr Chum, 57, is the first Asian to receive the highest honour in the plastics industry - he and seven others will be inducted into the Plastics Hall of Fame by the Plastics Academy in Chicago next month. He will join 145 distinguished inductees, including several Nobel laureates such as Paul Flory.

Photographs and a biography of the scientist will be displayed at the National Plastics Centre & Museum near Boston after his induction.

'It is a great honour to bring my family name Chum - which is rare - and my educational background at Hong Kong Baptist College [the forerunner to Hong Kong Baptist University] to the museum,' Dr Chum said.

'And I feel good [to be inducted] with Jack Welch, the legendary CEO from General Electric, at the same time.'