15 November, 2017
Director of the National Natural Science Foundation of China and professor of mechanical department of ZJU, academician Yang Wei received the Warner T. Koiter Award (hereinafter referred to as The Koiter Award) from the The American Society of Mechanical Engineers, hereinafter referred to as The ASME) on November 7, 2017, in recognition of his pioneering research in solid mechanics and numerous original achievements. He led the development of basic research in China towards higher quality and promoted a wider range of international cooperation.
On November 6 to 9, academician Yang Wei was invited to attend the International Mechanical Engineering Congress and Exposition (IMECE 2017) in Tampa, Florida, USA, and made a special invitation report for 45 minutes. In this report, he described the basic research status of China, highlighted the rapid development in recent years, as well as some excellent research work have been done (including soft fish studied by research team of Li Tiefeng and Huang Zhilong, research findings have been published in Science Advances in April 2017).
The Koiter Awards was established in 1996 in order to award scientists who have outstanding achievements in the field of solid mechanics in the combination of theory and application, and those who have leading and widely influence in the world in the field of mechanics. Past winners of the Koiter Award have been American and European scholars. Academician Yang Wei was the first person from the Asia-Pacific region to receive the award. At the awards party on nov 7, he hoped that in the future more Asia-Pacific scientists would win the Koiter Award and other mechanical awards.
Professor Yang Wei has recently won many academic awards. In June 2017, he was respectively awarded honorary doctorate by Aristotle University in Greece and Northwestern University in the United States.
