Leroy Chang
Traditional Chinese張立綱
Simplified Chinese张立纲

Leroy L. Chang (Chinese: 張立綱; 20 January 1936 – 10 August 2008) was an experimental physicist and solid state electronics researcher and engineer. Born in China, he studied in Taiwan and then the United States, obtaining his doctorate from Stanford University in 1963. As a research physicist he studied semiconductors for nearly 30 years at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center, New York. This period included pioneering work on superlattice heterostructures with Nobel Prize-winning physicist Leo Esaki.

In 1993, Chang moved from New York to Hong Kong, switching from industrial research into academia in anticipation of the 1997 transfer of the British colony to China. He was among the first wave of recruits to the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Over the following 14 years he helped build the university's reputation in his roles as dean of science, professor of physics, vice-president for academic affairs, and emeritus professor. He retired in 2001.

Honours bestowed on Chang included membership of the US National Academy of Sciences, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Academia Sinica, the national academy of Taiwan. Awards received included the International Prize for New Materials (1985), the David Sarnoff Award (1990) and the Stuart Ballantine Medal (1993). Chang's death in 2008 was marked with memorial services, and a symposium in his memory was held the following year.

Early life and education

Leroy L. Chang's family was from Jiutai County, Jilin province in Northeastern China (Manchuria). After Manchuria was occupied by Imperial Japan in 1931, his family escaped to inland China and Chang was born on 20 January 1936 in Kaifeng, Henan province.[1][2] His father was Zhang Shenfu, a well-known geologist and Republic of China official[1] who was assassinated by the Communists in 1946.[3] His mother, Li Xiangheng,[4] was one of the first group of women elected to the Legislative Yuan in 1948.

After moving to Taiwan, Chang studied electrical engineering at National Taiwan University, graduating in 1957.[5] He obtained his master's degree in 1961 at the University of South Carolina.[6] His doctorate (PhD) in solid-state electronics and electrical engineering was awarded by Stanford University in 1963.[5]

Industry, research and academia

Between 1963 and 1992, with the exception of a sabbatical year, Chang worked at IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center, New York, USA.[2] He held the position of researcher for some 12 years (1963 to 1968; 1969 to 1975), with a sabbatical year as associate professor at the department of electrical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1968-9).[7] On his return to IBM research, he spent 9 years as manager of its Molecular Beam Epitaxy section (1975 to 1984).[2] This was followed by 7 years as manager of the Quantum Structure section (1985 to 1992).[2] His research included semiconductor physics, low-dimensional electron systems, and nanostructures.[8] In the 1970s, he pioneered development of quantum well and superlattice structure (SLS) techniques.[5]

One of the key results from Chang's work in this period was using molecular beam epitaxy to grow superlattice structures in semiconductors. This research was described in a 1973 paper in Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology that was cited multiple times over the following years.[9] Eleven years later, in 1984, this pioneering research paper was featured as a Citation Classic by ISI, an organisation that tracks and measures impact factor and citation frequency and volume for journals and individual research papers.[10] Commentary for this retrospective article was provided by Chang.[11] The impact of the research carried out in the 1970s by Chang and his colleagues, including Nobel Prize-winning Leo Esaki and Ray Tsu, was highlighted by IBM researchers Theis and Coufal in 2004:

Leo Esaki, Ray Tsu, and Leroy Chang began to envision and investigate designed quantum structures — which are based on interfaces between lattice-matched compound semiconductors — early in the 1970s. Ever since, the study of electronic systems of minute dimensions has ranked among the most exciting areas of condensed-matter physics.[12]

After 29 years at IBM, Chang moved from industrial research into academia, being appointed the first dean of science at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) in 1993.[2][13] This was a new university, having been established in 1991. Chang's arrival was described in a 2011 account of the rise of this university: "Other recruits during the first decade included Leroy Chang, a world-renowned experimental physicist from International Business Machines (IBM)".[14] Chang held the position of dean of science until 1998, when he became Vice President of Academic Affairs until stepping down from this role in 2000.[2] During and after this period, from 1997 until his retirement in 2001, he was also Professor of Physics and Electrical and Electronic Engineering at the university.[8] Chang's departure from New York and arrival in Hong Kong in 1993 was part of a wider influx that saw many leading scientists and researchers taking up positions at universities and institutions in the British colony to be able to advantage of the opportunities presented by the 1997 transfer to Chinese control.[15] Quoted in an article in 1996, Chang stated:

I would never have come to Hong Kong if it was going to remain just a British colony. We came because of 1997.[15]

In addition to his work at HKUST, Chang also supported other science and technology institutions in Hong Kong and the wider region. From 1996 to 1998, he was president of the Hong Kong Institute of Science.[6] In 1998, Chang played a key role in the founding and establishment of the Research Center for Applied Sciences (RCAS) of the Academia Sinica in Taiwan, serving on its advisory committee.[5] He was emeritus professor at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology from his retirement on 15 March 2001 until his death.[16]

Awards and honours

Death and tributes

Chang died on 10 August 2008 in California, USA.[2] Memorial services were held in the El Camino Memorial Park, San Diego, USA,[5] and at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.[13] A memorial symposium in his honour, 'Recent Advances in Applied Sciences', was held in 2009 at the Academia Sinica.[22] The symposium program included "A Tribute to Academician Leroy Chang" and "Remembering Leroy: from SL/QW to RCAS".[23] At the time of his death, tributes were paid to Chang by his HKUST colleagues, including the university's founding president Chia-Wei Woo:

Leroy was always exuberant and high-spirited, logical and sensible, forceful and clear, efficient and effective – and always full of wit and humor. As Dean of Science and Vice-President for Academic Affairs, he gave up his beloved and world-renowned scientific career to work totally selflessly towards providing a sound academic environment for his colleagues. HKUST's founding members could not have had a stronger comrade-in-arms in building this new university. I so very deeply mourn his passing.[13]

Personal life

Chang's daughter Leslie T. Chang is an author and journalist who is married to Peter Hessler, author of several books about China.[24]

References

  1. 1 2 我是中国人 我是东北人 [I'm a Northeastern Chinese] (in Chinese). Government of Jilin. 21 September 2006. Archived from the original on 13 December 2013. Retrieved 5 February 2013.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 "Leroy Chang". Array of Contemporary American Physicists. American Institute of Physics. Archived from the original on 16 May 2013. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  3. ↑ Li Ao (9 September 2010). 老脸霸占万年国会. 李敖有话说 (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 19 February 2013. Retrieved 5 February 2013.
  4. ↑ Leslie T. Chang (2010) Factory Girls: Voices from the Heart of Modern China p95
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Academician Leroy L. Chang Passes Away in USA at Age 73". Academia Sinica E-news. No. 80. Academia Sinica. 2008. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 "Leroy L. Chang". Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  7. ↑ Solid state physics in the People's Republic of China: a trip report of the American Solid State Physics Delegation: submitted to the Committee on Scholarly Communication with the People's Republic of China. Issue 1 of People's Republic of China Series. National Academies. 1976. p. 170. ISBN 9780309025232.
  8. 1 2 3 "Franklin Laureate Database: Leroy L. Chang". Franklin Institute. Archived from the original on 15 April 2014. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  9. ↑ Chang, L. L.; Esaki, L.; Howard, W. E.; Ludeke, R.; Schul, G. (1973). "Structures Grown by Molecular Beam Epitaxy". Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology. American Vacuum Society. 10 (5): 655–662. Bibcode:1973JVST...10..655C. doi:10.1116/1.1318408. ISSN 0022-5355.
  10. ↑ See Garfield, Eugene. "Short History of Citation Classics Commentaries". University of Pennsylvania. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  11. ↑ Chang, Leroy L. (19 March 1984). "This Week's Citation Classic" (PDF). Current Contents. ISI (12): 18.
  12. ↑ Theis, Thomas N.; Coufal, Hans J. (April–May 2004). "How IBM Sustains the Leading Edge". The Industrial Physicist. American Institute of Physics. 10 (2): 18. Archived from the original on 2013-01-02.
  13. 1 2 3 "HKUST Mourns Passing of Former Vice-President". Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. 13 August 2008. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  14. ↑ Postiglione, Gerard A. (2011). "Chapter 3: The Rise of Research Universities: The Case of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology" (PDF). In Altbach, Philip G.; Salmi, Jamil (eds.). The Road to Academic Excellence: The making of World-Class Research Universities. The World Bank. pp. 63–100. ISBN 978-0821388051.
  15. 1 2 Kinoshita, June (24 May 1996). "Hong Kong's pre-1997 science boom". Science. 272 (5265): 1090–1091. Bibcode:1996Sci...272.1090K. doi:10.1126/science.272.5265.1090. S2CID 179028305. Archived from the original on 29 March 2015 – via HighBeam Research.
  16. ↑ "Academic Personnel News" (PDF). HKUST Academic Affairs newsletter. No. 2/01. Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. May 2001.
  17. ↑ "1985 James C. McGroddy Prize for New Materials Recipient". American Physical Society. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  18. ↑ "Dr. Leroy L. Chang". National Academy of Engineering. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  19. ↑ "IEEE - Fellows - C". Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Archived from the original on 2 November 2013. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  20. ↑ "IEEE David Sarnoff Award Recipients" (PDF). Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-05-09. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  21. ↑ "Backdrop: CAS Foreign Members (1994-2004)". Chinese Academy of Sciences. Archived from the original on 19 February 2013. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  22. ↑ "Dr. Leroy Chang Memorial Symposium: Recent Advances in Applied Sciences (introduction)". RCAS, Academia Sinica. Archived from the original on 3 March 2016. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  23. ↑ "Dr. Leroy Chang Memorial Symposium: Recent Advances in Applied Sciences (program)". RCAS, Academia Sinica. Archived from the original on 8 May 2009. Retrieved 5 January 2013.
  24. ↑ 从江城过客到中国行者：海斯勒家族的中国情结 [Hessler's China Connection] (in Chinese). Sina. 21 January 2013. Retrieved 5 February 2013.
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