We are approaching the start of the new year when everything starts afresh.  From the editor’s desk, let us wish you an early happy new year!  What is especially noteworthy now is that NTU has broken into the top 100 universities in the world, placing 95th in the London Times’ 2009 world university rankings. Moreover, NTU continues to be the number 1 university in Shanghai Jiaotong University’s academic ranking of world universities in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China.  The Financial Times of London also released the results of its Global EMBA rankings, and NTU’s EMBA program was ranked the 40th in the world.  Additionally, NTU was ranked at 102nd among world universities for scientific papers.  All of these results are quite extraordinary and exhilarating! 

As this issue of the alumni’s electronic bulletin goes to press, our school is celebrating its 81st anniversary.  This year President Si-Chen Lee conferred honorary doctoral degrees on two worthy candidates:  Mr. Yung-Ho Tsao for promoting the international reputation of Taiwan studies. He is truly a home-grown, self-made scholar whose perseverance is worthy of emulation by the next generation, and Mrs. Jacqueline Hwang Peng, a noble model for women scientists in Taiwan.  Their awe-inspiring achievements deserve our utmost respect.

In the area of honors, five professors of the NTU College of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science were elected to IEEE fellowships—the number of fellows is tops in the nation; also, eight NTU professors won awards from the Ministry of Education and two NTU chemists were named fellows of the Royal Society of Chemistry.  Additionally, one of our history professors authored a pictorial book of Taiwan History, which was nominated for Top 100 at the East Asia Publishers Conference. As to student achievements, the American Geophysics Union presented an NTU Geosciences student with an Outstanding Paper Award, and the NTU team won the prestigious DAC/ISSCC student Design Contest for the fourth time.  The College of Electrical /Engineering and Computer Science led a student team, which grabbed three top prizes at the 2009 National Robotics Contest in August.  In addition, Dr. Charles K. Kao, NTU’s former chair professor by special appointment, won the Nobel Prize in Physics.

As to outstanding research results, NTU researchers produced electro-luminesence from ZnO/Si-nanotips Array Light Emitting Diodes; SOPAS investigated genetic and environmental causes of schizophrenia; CQSE used a supercomputer built from common graphics cards to study quantum physics, and the Angiogenesis Research Center brought NTU scholars together to promote the biotech industry.  Also, we saw the fully automatic AI tour guide robot premiered by NTU students after three years of research and development.  As to medical breakthroughs, NTU researchers designed a leading software predictor for identifying DNA-binding residues in transcription factors; Microarray Core Laboratory developed novel gene detection and analytic methods for microarrays; Microbial Genomics Core Laboratory used genomic approaches to study infectious diseases, and effective gene targeting service earned international acclaim for gene knockout mouse core laboratory.  The contents of this current issue are, needless to say, abundant and exciting!