Five student-exchange agreements signed
Professor H K Chang, University President, visited seven universities in Asia on his recent trips to Seoul, Manila, Singapore and Colombo, in late June and July. Professor Chang brought home five student-exchange agreements signed with Seoul National University, Korea University, Sungkyunkwan University, the University of the Philippines, and the University of Colombo. He also renewed acquaintances with faculty members and sought to strengthen existing student exchange agreements with Yonsei University and the National University of Singapore.

Socio-economic and cultural developments in Southeast Asia are advancing rapidly. Professor Chang stressed that in the drive to pursue internationalization, usually by maintaining and increasing links with universities in the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and mainland China, CityU should pay attention to cultivating relationships — especially in developing opportunities for student exchange — with universities in neighbouring countries such as South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.

Upgrading Young Chung-Yee Health Centre
Maintenance and improvement work for the Young Chung-Yee Health Centre located on 4/F, Amenities Building, is close to completion. Normal operations will resume on 21 August. On the same day, operations at the temporary Health Centre located on 3/F, Fong Yun Wah Building,will cease.

The revamped clinics have added three new consultation rooms for two new medical doctors and a new dentist. The ventilation systems have also been improved. In addition, there are now different entrances for the Dental Clinic and Medical Clinic in order to minimize the risks of cross-infection between patients.

Emerging Technologies Forum
A forum "Go Wireless 2006 — Hong Kong's Competitive Advantages" organized by the Technology Transfer Office will be held from 3:00 pm to 5:30 pm, 15 September, at City Top Restaurant. Registration is required by 6 September. Seats will be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis.

Forum speakers include Dr I Chih-lin, Vice-President and R&D Director, Advanced Wireless Technologies, Communications Technologies Group, ASTRI. Dr I will speak on "Wireless communications and ASTRI R&D". Ir Peter Yeung, Senior Manager, Technology Support, Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks Corporation, will speak on "Wireless communications test support in Hong Kong Science Park". Dr Tsang Kim-fung, an associate professor in CityU's Department of Electronic Engineering, will give a talk titled "When ZigBee starts to boom". For more details, please visit: www.cityu.edu.hk/tto

Kudos
Mr Justin Chan Yiu-ting, a final-year student of BEng (Hons) Mechatronic Engineering, clinched the top prize in the university category and the final championship in August at the Technology, Environmental Protection and Innovation Competition organized by Metro City. The competition was opened to primary and secondary school and university students in Hong Kong with an aim to enhance interest in science and technology. Mr Chan's winning project was an underwater sampling vehicle which uses a semi-permeable membrane device to detect poisonous substances in sea water. His project was under the supervision of Dr Luk Bing-lam and Dr Louis Liu King-pui, respectively a senior engineer and an instructor in the Department of Manufacturing Engineering and Engineering Management.

Mr Gvyer Lau Kwok-leung, a graduate of the 1993 Class of BSc (Hons) Applied Physics and 2001 Class of MBA programmes, was awarded the Chief Executive's Award for Teaching Excellence 2005–2006. Mr Lau, one of the 42 awardees this year, now teaches at the Assembly of God Hebron Secondary School.

More kudos
The award-winning artificial intelligence software called “Engineering Works & Traffic Information Management System (ETMS)” that Dr Andy Chun Hon-wai, an associate professor in the Department of Computer Science, developed in collaboration with the MTR Corporation has won Project of the Year in the ZDNet Asia Smart50 Awards. ZDNet Asia is an online publication dedicated to tracking the latest news and developments in technology from around the world. ETMS has won a clutch of major awards in recent months, and it is the first application of its kind in the world.

Art exhibitions
The first batch of about 30 graduates of the Advanced-level Lingnan style Ink-wash Painting class in the School of Continuing and Professional Education will display more than 60 art works from 24 to 29 August at the CityU Gallery. An opening ceremony will be held at 11:00 am on 26 August at the Gallery.

The Chinese Civilisation Centre is organizing "The Works of Gao Made" at the CityU Gallery from 9 September to 30 October, displaying more than 50 of Mr Gao's paintings on Chinese opera characters. An opening ceremony will be held at 5:30 pm, 8 September, at the Gallery.