Newsletter No. 205

A Vote of Thanks to Scholarship Donors T he University held a Galloping Horses Presentation Ceremony on 29th May in the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in Wanchai to express its gratitude to donors of scholarships for its students. The support of these donors have made possible the presentation of some 140 scholarship awards to deserving students newly admitted into the University in 2001-2. A ll of them have excelled themselves in University entrance examinations. Officiating at the ceremony were Dr. the Honourable Rosanna Wong Yick-ming, chair of the Education Commission, and Prof. Arthur K.C. Li, vice-chancellor of the University. In attendance were the donors or their representatives, the scholarship recipients, their parents, and their secondary school teachers and principals. Projec t to Develo p Affordabl e Bon e Protei n for Surger y The University has entered into a research agreement with Genius International Holdings Ltd. to develop a technique to produce bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) as a therapeutic device for bone fractures and defects. The new technique will involve the utilization of recombinant DNA and protein engineering technology. The agreement was signed by Mr. Peter Lam, group director of Genius, and Mrs. Alice Yip, director of the University's Research and Technology Administration Office, witnessed by Prof. Joseph Sung, chairman of the Research Committee, and Dr. L i Ming, principal investigator of the project. Medical evidence has shown that BMPs, a series of proteins found in the bone's organic matrix, can stimulate bone growth and can be of extensive use in bone surgery. However there are only traces of natural BMPs in the human body and synthesized ones are too expensive to be used for general bone surgery. The objective of the project is to develop a low-cost alternative technique of p r oduc i ng, p u r i f y i n g, and r e f o l d i ng recombinant BMPs in order to make them affordable to most patients around the world, especially those in developing countries. The ultimate goal is to develop a series of second- generation BMP products by combining recombinant BMPs with an organic extract from a Chinese herbal medicine that w i ll potently enhance the effectiveness of BMPs and can be used for bone fractures or defects in cases where BMPs alone may not be effective enough. CUHK Student Wins Prestigious Award for Accounting Studies M iss Florence Lo Man Ting, a student of United College who has just com- pleted her first-year studies at the School of Accountancy, has won the 2002 award of the Sanford Yung Scholars Programme for Ex ce l l ence in A c c o u n t i ng Studies (SYSPEAS). This is the second time a CUHK student has been awarded the scholarship since its inception last year. Established in 2001 by Mr. Sanford Yung, a renowned figure in the accounting profession and former Chairman of Coopers & Lybrand Hong Kong (now renamed Pricewaterhouse Coopers), SYSPEAS provides one scholarship per year to be awarded through open competition to the most outstanding first-year student in accounting in a local university. The scholarship provides a cash award of HK$200,000 to cover all expenses relating to the awardee's accounting studies in university for the second and third years. Upon the successful completion of his/her second-year's course, the awardee shall be sponsored for an eight-week summer placement at one of the Big Four Firms in an overseas city, w i th return air ticket plus HK$30,000 for personal expenses provided. A total of 27 first-year accounting students were recommended by six local universities for the 2002 SYSPEAS award. At the presentation ceremony held on 3rd June, Mr. Sanford Yung remarked that apart from her impressive academic achievements, Miss Florence Lo has been very active in voluntary service and maintained a brilliant extracurricular record. Awardee of the 2001 SYSPEAS scholarship, Miss Jeanette Lee Kwan Tung has just completed her second-year studies at the School of Accountancy and will leave for the UK next month for an eight-week t r a i n i ng at PricewaterhouseCoopers, London. (From left) Mr. Sanford Yung, Miss Florence Lo Man Ting, and Prof. Arthur K. C. Li, vice-chancellor of the University Asian Students Meet to Discuss Higher Education S tudents from 38 Asian universities gathered at Chung Chi College to take part in two concurrent student conferences, one on 'Higher Education in the New Century: Hong Kong, China, and the World', and the other on 'Christian Higher Education in Asia: Changes and Challenges'. The functions were hosted by the college from 29th May to 4th June in celebration of its 50th anniversary. The aim of the conferences was to enable the delegates to exchange their experiences in higher education and construct their own ideal higher education models. Seventy-three students, including 22 from Chung Chi, 42 from mainland China, and nine from Taiwan, took part in the first conference to study issues including the functions and educa t i onal ideals o f a university at the crossroads of the global and the local, the marketability and politicization of higher education, how higher education cultivates creativity, and the meanings and value o f un i ve r s i ty education to life. Another group of 34 students from Chung Ch i, Hong Kong Baptist University, Lingnan University, and universities in Taiwan, Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Thailand, and Indonesia discussed in the second conference the functions and educational ideals of a university, Christian professionals in Asian society, Christian life on campus, social and political actions from a Christian perspective, and intervarsity Christian student networking. The opening of the conferences took place on 30th May in the Esther Lee Building, with Prof. Liu Pak-wai, pro-vice- chancellor, officiating at the ceremony. Air tickets for participants from mainland China and Taiwan for the first conference were sponsored by Dragon Air. Renowned Figure in Technology Speaks on Human-centred Comput ing P rof. Victor Zue (middle), professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the Massachusettes Institute of Technology, and director of the institute's Laboratory for Computer Science, delivered a distinguished lecture entitled '"Project Oxygen": Towards Pervasive, Human-centred Computing' on 28th May in the Ho Sin-Hang Engineering Building in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the Faculty of Engineering. In the lecture, Prof. Zue spoke on his brainchild 'Project Oxygen', a US$40 million-dollar project sponsored by the US Department of Defence. The project strives to bring about revolutionary changes in the ways computers and humans interact through a vision of pervasive, human- centred computing. In the future, it is predicted that computation w i ll be freely available everywhere, like batteries and power sockets, or oxygen in the air we breathe. Prof. Zue has consulted for many multinational corporations and served on many planning, advisory, and review committees of the US Department of Defence. Loca l ly he has advised the Hong Kong government on the strategic planning of information technology in a book e n t i t l ed Made by Hong Kong w h i c h he co- authored.