1. Chih-Kung Jen was a Chinese physicist who emigrated to the US and participated in some of the 20th century's major scientific, political and social developments in both the United States and China.
14 Facts About Chih-Kung Jen
1. 2.
Chih-Kung Jen completed his graduate studies first at the University of Pennsylvania, and then in physics at Harvard University.
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In 1937, Chih-Kung Jen returned to China, and subsequently joined in the "Academic Long March" to set up a wartime refugee university in Kunming.
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Chih-Kung Jen's wartime teaching and research contributed to the training of what would become the nucleus of the present-day Chinese scientific intelligentsia.
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In 1972, following Richard Nixon's visit to China, Chih-Kung Jen led a ground-breaking delegation of Chinese American scientists to that country.
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Chih-Kung Jen continued to work on strengthening US-China scientific relations, and in addition was a leader in improving scientific education in Chinese universities.
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Shanxi Province is part of the Yellow River Valley which served as the "cradle of Chinese civilization," but by the time of Chih-Kung Jen's birth, was a largely arid region populated by poor farmers struggling with overworked soil and periodic flooding.
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Chih-Kung Jen was the second son in a family with five children.
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Chih-Kung Jen began his elementary school education at age 11 and two years later entered middle school.
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Chih-Kung Jen returned to Tsinghua in 1934 and continued his research in numerous areas of experimental physics, including the effects of microwave radiation on animate objects, anticipating the microwave oven by some thirty years.
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Chih-Kung Jen devoted the latter part of his life to improving relations between the US and China, and to the modernization of education, especially in physics, in China.
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Chih-Kung Jen presented a series of lectures on recent advances in physics, including the Hall effect and nonlinear dynamics, to university students throughout China, and lectured in the US and Canada on developments in China since 1949.
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Chih-Kung Jen was granted honorary professorships by Tsinghua and four other universities.
14.
Chih-Kung Jen died on November 19,1995, at a daughter's home in Needham, Massachusetts.