Faculty of Science, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) - Facts

Facts

1963 Faculty of Science founded, with the Departments of Mathematics (1954), Chemistry (1956), Physics (1956) and Biology (1957) coexisting in the respective Colleges as independent yet closely affiliated units
1969 The first M.Phil. programmes introduced
1970 Department of Electronics established
1971 Department of Biochemistry – a joint venture of the Faculties of Science and Medicine – established
1972

University Science Centre opened

1973 Department of Computer Science established
1981 The first Ph.D. programmes introduced
1982 Department of Statistics established
1989 First part-time programme, in Mathematics and Statistics, launched
1990 Second part-time programme, in Biology and Chemistry, launched
1991 Departments of Electronics and Computer Science left the Faculty of Science to form the new Faculty of Engineering
1995-1998 Part-time programmes phased out in view of increased provision of similar courses by other tertiary institutions, and later redeployed the resources to developing new full-time programmes
1994 Environmental Science and Food & Nutritional Sciences, first two out of seven new undergraduate interdisciplinary programmes, launched
1998 Materials Science (later renamed Materials Science and Engineering in 2001) and Molecular Biotechnology programmes launched
1999 Chinese Medicine programme launched (administered under the School of Chinese Medicine)
2000

UGC-AoE Centre for Plant and Agricultural Biotechnology established under the support of first round of UGC AoE scheme launched in 1999. The first Areas of Excellence (AoE) project in CUHK and the Faculty of Science

Centre for Promoting Science Education established

Risk Management Science programme launched

2001 Applied Chemistry with Management Studies programme launched, which was subsequently phased out by 2007
2006 Double Degree Programme in Mathematics and Information Engineering launched (jointly administered by the Faculties of Science and Engineering)
2008 State Key Laboratory (SKL) of Agrobiotechnology (CUHK) established, the first SKL of CUHK Science
2009 Cell and Molecular Biology Programme launched;
Interdisciplinary Major Programme in Quantitative Finance and Risk Management Science launched (jointly administered by the Faculties of Science and Business Administration)
2010

Establishment of the School of Life Sciences by merging Biochemistry and Biology departments, and four programmes, Cell and Molecular Biology, Environmental Science, Food and Nutritional Sciences and Molecular Biotechnology, under the Faculty of Science

Science Academy for Young Talent established

2011 The centralized laboratory building of CUHK was officially named as the Run Run Shaw Science Building
2012 SCIENCE broad-based admission scheme and Earth System Science programme launched
2013

Science Faculty 50th Anniversary;
The School of Chinese Medicine migrated to the Faculty of Medicine

The research facility was officially renamed as the Shiu-Ying Hu Herbarium for the extension of the legacy of the late Prof. Hu’s contribution in plant taxonomy

2014 Natural Sciences, the first programme at the Science Faculty for articulation of local Associate Degree/Higher Diploma Holders, launched
2017 Science, Technology And Research Stream (STARS) launched
2022 Earth System Science programme and Environmental Science programme were integrated to form a new programme: Earth and Environmental Sciences;
Double Major Programme in Biology and Chemistry launched;
Three joint-faculty programmes, (i) Biotechnology, Entrepreneurship and Healthcare Management, (ii) Computational Data Science, and (iii) Learning Design and Technology, launched
2023 Science Faculty 60th Anniversary