Prize-winning US physicist Gao Huajian returns to China after decades overseas
- ‘Master researcher’ joins Tsinghua University for next chapter of glittering international career that has included top awards in his field
- The expert in solid mechanics said he is thrilled to be back in China and hopes to inspire his students to do cutting-edge research
In a release announcing the appointment, Qiu Yong, secretary of the university’s party committee, said the mechanician was known as a “master researcher” in his field. “We feel very lucky and touched that out of many options, he chose to become a member of the Tsinghua family.”
According to Qiu, Gao is expected to play “an indispensable role” in talent training and innovation, using his international influence to boost its engineering programmes, and eventually “help China achieve scientific and technological self-reliance”.
In a video posted on the university’s official WeChat account on Sunday, Gao said that he had wanted to return to China for a long time.
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“I can’t express how thrilled I am to start this new chapter in my life. Tsinghua has so many excellent students. I hope to inspire their confidence and passion so that they can do cutting-edge research,” he said.
Gao, most recently a distinguished professor at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore, has also been a tenured professor at Stanford and Brown universities in the US, and served as director of the Max Planck Institute for Metals Research in Stuttgart.
Gao’s research ranges from materials science to nanotechnology and bioengineering, with a focus on the macro and micro-scale deformation and destruction of materials, structures, and biological systems.
Awards for his pioneering and cross-disciplinary research include the 2012 Rodney Hill Prize in Solid Mechanics, the 2021 Timoshenko Medal in Applied Mechanics, and the 2023 American Society of Mechanical Engineers Medal.
According to the Rodney Hill Prize selection panel, Gao’s work “established new links between solid mechanics and other fundamental fields of study” and “literally redefined the frontiers of modern solid mechanics research”.
In recent years, Gao has been working with collaborators to develop novel biomedical materials, including a “smart patch” to help patients recover from heart diseases and nanoparticles that can kill drug-resistant bacteria.
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Gao and his team have also developed protective outfits for older people which mimic the tough but flexible scales of pangolins and armadillos.
Gao was born into an academic family in Chengdu, in the southwestern province of Sichuan, in 1963, earning his bachelor’s degree from the Xian Jiaotong University at 19 – school was shortened during the Cultural Revolution, he explained to a Singapore newspaper in 2021.
He went on to study in the US, receiving his PhD in engineering science from Harvard University in 1988.
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During his time at both Stanford and Brown, Gao helped to train dozens of Chinese students. Many of them have returned to China and become leading researchers in their field.
Gao has also given more than 100 talks at Chinese universities and research institutes, and co-authored a large number of papers with domestic scholars.
His memberships have included the national academies of many countries, including the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering of the United States, as well as Germany’s National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. Gao is also registered as a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
