Peking University, Mar. 23, 2016:
It’s hard to label Huang Ru.
“Dean Huang” of the School of Electronics Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) is not suitable because she is not in bureaucratic style at all despite her tight schedule for administrative work. “Predecessor” is not good enough as well for her relatively young age and her smooth career development. Born at the end of 1960s, Huang Ru was recognized as the associated professor in 1999, and was appointed the head of the EECS before turning 45. She is the youngest female academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences for now.
Huang Ru
Life track: plain but successful
Huang Ru was born and grew up in Jiangsu Province. She showed an outstanding study capability throughout her primary and middle school. Her marvelous performance got recognition—she was guaranteed admission to Nanjing College of Engineering (now known as Southeast University), where she got the master degree in Electronic Engineering. Then she came to PKU for the doctoral degree in EECS and was guided by her tutor Prof. Wang Yangyuan, a leading figure in the domain of microelectronic sciences. In 1997, after getting her Ph.D. degree, she was faced with a vital choice between working overseas and teaching at PKU. Finally she took the teaching position out of the love for PKU, and for her study of low power consumption components here, which is the key of microelectronic sciences. She has been persisting in this area for more than 20 years. Due to the brilliant research, Huang was promoted the professor and doctoral supervisor exceptionally in 2002.
“My track was simple and plain with few legendary stories or complicated plots”, Huang commented on her experiences. From student to professor, Huang has always been on campus till now, which is deemed “quite well” by her. “There are few distractions here, allowing me to be immersed in the research and teaching.” After many years of hard work, now she can work with respected scientists such as Prof. Wang in microelectronic science for further achievement.
Huang Ru recognized as Academician
Life schedule: tight but substantial
Huang’s life is fairly busy. She is “obsessed to working” in her students’ eyes. “She comes to office earlier than me everyday and goes back home later as well even though I leave quite late.” her student Yang Libo says.
Her to-do list usually includes giving lectures titled “Microelectronic study and fundamentals of electric circuit” to 180 freshmen; regular meeting with doctoral students; commenting on postgraduates’ paper;cooperating with domestic and international teams in academic subjects and dealing with administrative work of EECS.
But Huang can keep relaxed when faced with such miscellaneous work.”I love my work and it can make my life substantial. Switching between different missions helps to improve efficiency as well.” she feels quite proud of the capability of making overall arrangements with a productive schedule. When in middle school, she was influenced by a text about overall plan-making methodwritten by a famous Chinese mathematician Hua Luogeng. After years of practicing, it gradually becomes one of her good habits and benefits her a lot in later years.
Huang took the position of dean of EECS in 2014, starting taking charge of the whole school, which means more responsibility. But the core of administration and academic research are similar for her—to find problems and solve them. The two domains share common experience. ”Whatever you do, there must be some common methods and principles in them.” Huang says.
Research career: excellent and creative
Huang’s academic research focuses on low and super-low power consumption components. The field has undergone significant developments in integrated electronic circuits in recent years. More applications require this technology such as telecommunicates, smart hardware, Internet of objects, wearable device, etc. Huang and her team have made several breakthroughs based on the different power or function demand of relevant electronic system. “There are more interesting work to do in this field.”
“My story is simple and plain. I pursue nothing but accomplishing my job well.” She always keeps the curiosity of her research, persists in it and tries to do something new. “You can smell the device when you pourall passion into it. This is a state of resonating with device and that’s when ideas sparkle.” She says.
”Value your dream, persist in your task, and reach destination in the end”, she advises the young generation. And when asked about the changes of life after becoming the Academician, she says ”Nothing has changed significantly. Life goes as it should be.”
Written by: Wang Zehua
Edited by: Yan Shengnan
