New batch of outstanding scholars joins UM

Over the years, the University of Macau (UM) has been recruiting high-calibre scholars from around the world, with the aim of building a faculty team with extensive influence on the international academia. This year, UM recruited 57 new faculty members. They include senior scholars and experts from different countries and regions as well as young academics born and bred in Macao. Together they will give new impetus to teaching and research at the university.

The new faculty members hold various positions at UM. Some have been appointed as chair professor or distinguished professor, while some work in management roles in the university’s departments or research centres. With diverse academic backgrounds and extensive experience in teaching and research, many of the scholars are highly regarded in international academic circles.

Director of Institute of Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences
Department of Global Legal Studies of the Faculty of Law
Chair Professor Yu Xingzhong

Prof Yu Xingzhong is an internationally renowned scholar in the field of jurisprudence. He obtained his Master of Laws and Doctor of Juridical Science from Harvard University in the United States. He has accumulated 30 years of teaching and research experience at well-known universities such as Cornell University, Chinese University of Hong Kong, and Harvard University and was appointed as the Anthony W and Lulu C Wang Professor in Chinese Law in the Law School of Cornell University in the United States. Prof Yu is currently a chair professor in the Department of Global Legal Studies of the Faculty of Law of UM and director of the university’s Institute of Advanced Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences.

Faculty of Arts and Humanities
Head of the Department of Chinese Language and Literature
Chair Professor Yuan Yulin

Prof Yuan Yulin is a leading scholar in theoretical linguistics and Chinese linguistics, with a focus on areas such as syntax, semantics, and pragmatics. He obtained his PhD from Peking University and has worked in the Department of Chinese Language and Literature of the university for around 25 years. He was awarded the Changjiang Distinguished Professorship by the Ministry of Education in 2015 and was selected to join the ‘Ten Thousand Talent Programme’ of China as a leading scholar in the areas of philosophy and social sciences in 2017. He has published more than ten books and over 200 journal articles, with a number of articles being published in top academic journals. Prof Yuan is currently head of the Department of Chinese Language and Literature of UM’s Faculty of Arts and Humanities.

Faculty of Arts and Humanities
Head of the Department of Portuguese
Professor João Veloso

Prof João Veloso is a renowned Portuguese linguist with a research focus on phonology. He obtained his bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD degrees from the University of Porto. Before joining UM, he was pro-rector of the University of Porto. With extensive experience in teaching, research, management, and knowledge transfer, he has authored or co-authored around 100 publications, most of which are related to the field of Portuguese phonetics and phonology. He is also a member of many academic associations in the field of linguistics, including International Phonetic Association, Societas Linguistica Europaea, and the Association for Language Typology. He is currently head of the Department of Portuguese of UM’s Faculty of Arts and Humanities.

Faculty of Arts and Humanities
Department of History
Distinguished Professor Lin Shaoyang

Prof Lin Shaoyang obtained his PhD from the University of Tokyo. He was a full professor and a member of the professoriate of the university. He also taught at the City University of Hong Kong twice for a short period. His research interests include intellectual, political, diplomatic, and literary histories of China and Japan from the early modern period onward. Prof Lin publishes actively and extensively in Japanese, English, and Chinese and is the author of four books in Chinese and Japanese. His fifth book is about to be published in Japan and he is about to complete two book manuscripts, one in English and the other in Chinese. He is also an advisor and editor for several international journals, including the Journal of Japanese Philosophy and China and Asia: A Journal in Historical Studies. He is currently a Distinguished Professor in the Department of History of UM’s Faculty of Arts and Humanities.

Faculty of Science and Technology
State Key Laboratory of Internet of Things for Smart City
Distinguished Professor Zhou Xiaobo

Prof Zhou Xiaobo is a renowned scholar in the field of distributed systems and cloud computing. After receiving his PhD in computer science from Nanjing University, he joined the Department of Computer Science of the University of Colorado Colorado Springs and was tenured there. He has published more than 100 academic papers and was a recipient of the US NSF CAREER Award in 2009. Prof Zhou is currently the chair of the IEEE Technical Community on Distributed Processing and a Distinguished Professor in UM’s Faculty of Science and Technology and State Key Laboratory of Internet of Things for Smart City.

Faculty of Science and Technology
Interim Director of the Centre for Regional Oceans
Associate Professor Xu Jie

Prof Xu Jie is a renowned scholar in the field of ocean science. He received his PhD in marine environmental science from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He was formerly a research professor at the South China Sea Institute of Oceanology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), the associate director of the State Key Laboratory of Tropical Oceanography of CAS, as well as a professor at the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences. He has published more than 50 academic papers, and is currently a member of the UNESCO’s Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission Expert Working Group on Climate Change and the Change Trend of Offshore Phytoplankton. He is also the associate editor or a member of the editorial board of multiple international oceanographic journals. Prof Xu is currently the interim director of the Centre for Regional Oceans of UM’s Faculty of Science and Technology.

UM attaches great importance to the nurturing of scholars from Macao. The new batch of faculty members also includes young local academics who were born in the 90s.

Faculty of Science and Technology
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Assistant Professor Lei Iek Man

Dr Lei Iek Man is a MEng graduate in chemical engineering of Imperial College London (1st class honours) in 2016 and she obtained her PhD from the University of Cambridge in 2022. Her research interests include advanced fabrication technology of soft materials, hydrogel, and bioinspired design of soft materials. During her PhD studies, she received several awards, including the PhD Student Award from the Cambridge Society for the Application of Research, the Best Graduate Student Award from the International Society for Biofabrication, and WD Armstrong studentship from the Cambridge School of Technology. She was also nominated as a representative of the University of Cambridge at the Global Young Scientists Summit 2022. Dr Lei has published a series of articles in internationally-renowned journals, including Nature Communications and Advanced Functional Materials. She is currently an assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of UM’s Faculty of Science and Technology.

UM attracts high-calibre scholars from around the world. Many of them are graduates of world-renowned universities and are highly regarded in their fields by the academia and industry.

Faculty of Business Administration
Department of Finance and Business Economics
Professor Kang Wenjin

Prof Kang Weijin is a renowned scholar and expert in finance. He received his Bachelor of Science and PhD in management from Peking University and the University of California, Los Angeles, respectively. He has taught at the National University of Singapore, the Renmin University of China, and the Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, with extensive research and teaching experience in different areas of finance. He has published many influential papers in top finance journals and leading international journals and his research work has received more than 1,500 Google Scholar citations. He has also written articles about the development of Chinese financial markets for many well-known Chinese newspapers. Prof Kang is currently a professor in the Department of Finance and Business Economics of UM’s Faculty of Business Administration.

Faculty of Arts and Humanities
Department of English
Assistant Professor Tsai Cheng-Yu

Dr Tsai Cheng-Yu received his PhD in linguistics from Harvard University, where he also served as a college fellow in the university’s Department of Linguistics. Before joining UM, he taught at the City University of Hong Kong. Prof Tsai has published 15 journal articles and proceedings papers in theoretical linguistics, and has extensive teaching and advising experience for both undergraduate and postgraduate students. He is currently an assistant professor of linguistics in UM’s Department of English.

Faculty of Health Sciences
Assistant Professor Robert Smith

Dr Robert Smith obtained his PhD from the University of Keele in the United Kingdom and was a researcher at the University of Hong Kong. His research areas include health inequalities, mental health and physical multimorbidity, perinatal depression, healthcare big data, and epidemiological research. He has published over 20 academic papers across a broad spectrum of clinical topics and quantitative research methods. He is currently an assistant professor in UM’s Faculty of Health Science.

Faculty of Law
Department of Global Legal Studies
Assistant Professor Célia Matias

Dr Célia Matias, who was born in Portugal, has been working in the legal sector of Macao for more than ten years. She is qualified as a lawyer in both Portugal and Macao and has accumulated many years of experience practicing in both places. She also has extensive experience in corporate and financial transactions, intellectual property advice and litigation, data protection and other areas of compliance. Dr Matias obtained her master’s and PhD degrees from the University of Hong Kong. She also holds a bachelor’s degree in law from the University of Lisbon and a postgraduate certificate in business law from the University of Coimbra. Dr Matias joined UM as a UM Macao Fellow in 2020. She was appointed this year as an assistant professor in the Department of Global Legal Studies of UM’s Faculty of Law.

Faculty of Social Sciences
Department of Economics
Assistant Professor Tao Yubo

Dr Tao Yubo is an emerging scholar in financial econometrics and empirical finance. He obtained his PhD in economics from Singapore Management University and has extensive teaching and research experience in economics and finance. His research focuses on developing and applying new statistical models to economic and financial data and finding new factors or predictors for asset returns in the short-term and long-term. He has published papers in top international journals, including Management Science and the Journal of Econometrics. Dr Tao is currently an assistant professor in the Department of Economics of UM’s Faculty of Social Sciences and a research fellow in Asian economy in the university’s Asia-Pacific Academy of Economics and Management.

Full list of the new batch of UM scholars: 

UM has recruited a team of high-calibre faculty members from around the world. Many of them have earned prestigious titles, such as member of Academia Europaea (Academy of Europe), fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, fellow of the Institution of Engineering and Technology, member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts, member of the Portuguese Academy of Sciences, fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers, fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, fellow of the Society of Photographic Instrumentation Engineers, and Chang Jiang Scholar Chair Professor (Ministry of Education).