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PAIR’s research institutes and research centres attain excellent results in the Environment and Conservation Fund 2021-22 research funding exercise

The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) has achieved excellent results in the Environment and Conservation Fund (ECF) 2021-22 funding exercise for Environmental Research, Technology Demonstration and Conference Projects. The ECF was set up by the Government in 1994 for funding educational and research projects on environmental and conservation matters. Research and Technology Demonstration Projects awarded by the ECF will contribute in a direct and practical way towards environmental improvement and conservation of the local environment, or promote and encourage adoption of green technologies in Hong Kong. Among the 41 awarded research projects from local UGC-funded universities, PolyU received the highest number of projects awarded and topped the amount of funding granted. In all, the University received a total of HK$10 million in funding from the ECF, supporting 13 research projects ranging from the study of how high purity oxygen could enhance sewage treatment, using remote sensing technology and AI for monitoring oil spills in the sea, producing hydrogen while purifying wastewater simultaneously by solar power, to the development of a smart robot that can pick up and sort litter in difficult terrain automatically.  In which, 10 research projects with the total of HK$8.5 million in funding from the ECF were granted to the following PAIR’s constituent research units:   Project Lead Researcher Funding Amount Related RI/RC Engineering a microbial biosensor for monitoring microplastics pollution Dr CHUA Song Lin Assistant Professor, ABCT HK$499,000 RCDSE Green Conversion of Microalgal Biomass into High Value Products Dr YUNG Ka-fu Associate Professor, ABCT HK$498,000 RISE Optimal design of high performance textile-based solar steam generator by tunable capillary evaporation Dr SHOU Dahua Assistant Professor, ITC HK$485,300 RISE Innovative Bifacial Solar Photovoltaic: from theoretical model to its practical application in Hong Kong Ir Prof. LU Lin Vivien Professor, BEEE HK$494,000 RISE and RISUD World Meteorological Organization (WMO) - Global Atmosphere Watch (GAW) VOC Expert Workshop Ir Prof. GUO Hai Professor, CEE HK$500,000 RISUD Study of High Purity Oxygen Aeration for Biological Polishing of Chemical Enhanced Primary Treated Sewage Effluent and Cellulase Production from Sludge Dr LEU Shao Yuan Associate Professor, CEE HK$1,999,800 RISUD and RCRE Recycling yard waste into new-generation biochar adsorbents for CO2 and VOCs removal Prof. Dan TSANG Professor, CEE HK$1,179,557 RCRE Climate-Resilient Planning and Design for Coastal Stormwater Drainage Systems Dr WANG Shuo Assistant Professor, LSGI HK$490,600 RILS A multi-source remote sensing based technique for monitoring oil spills Prof. Charles Man-sing WONG Professor, LSGI HK$1,920,520 RILS Intelligent monitoring and diagnosis platform for second-life battery energy storage systems based on artificial intelligence and internet of things technologies Dr WANG Minghao Research Assistant Professor, EE HK$499,000 RISE Total Funding Amount: HK$8,565,777  

Interdisciplinary research projects under PAIR received huge grant

The Research Grant Committee (RGC) announced the funding results of the Research Impact Fund (RIF) 2021/22, Collaborative Research Fund (CRF) in 2021/22 and Second Round One-off CRF COVID-19 and Novel Infectious Diseases (NID) Research Exercise earlier this year.  Seven interdisciplinary research projects conducted by PAIR’s constituent research units received over HK$36 million grant in total.  Research project Project Coordinator Research Institute / Research Centre involved Amount awarded RGC CRF 2021/22 Research Equipment Grant High performance deep learning clusters for big data analytics Prof. Chen Xiaojun RIAIoT, SCRI and RCSV $3,099,659 Advanced Fourier-transform Electron Paramagnetic Resonance Spectrometer for Molecular and Nano Functional Materials Research Prof. Raymond Wong Wai-yeung RISE and RI-IWEAR $7,964,914 RGC CRF 2021/22 Research Project Grant Study of Carbon Sequestration in Hong Kong’s Vegetation: from Present to Future Prediction under Climate Change Prof. Charles Wong Man-sing RILS and RISUD $4,949,639 RGC Research Impact Fund 2021/22 Deeper understanding of Color Matching Mechanism for Developing High-quality Lighting and Imaging Systems Dr Tommy Wei Minchen PRI and RISUD   Total amount of $8,800,000 Reliable Multiagent Collaborative Global Navigation Satellite System Positioning for Intelligent Transportation Systems Dr Hsu Li Ta RISUD and RIAIoT Second Round One-off CRF COVID-19 and NID Research Exercise in 2021/22 Is the usual social distance sufficient to avoid airborne infection of expiratory droplets in indoor environments? Prof. Guo Hai RILS and RISUD $4,703,090 Spatiotemporal prediction and real-time early warning of COVID-19 onset risk Prof. John Shi Wenzhong SCRI $6,964,000