Meet Our Academicians

Professor Wallace Woon-Fong Leung is a renowned transdisciplinary engineer, with a multitude of significant contributions to the field. His journey began at Cornell University, where he completed his BSc in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, graduating with the highest GPA among all the students in the engineering college. He achieved this remarkable feat on a full scholarship, finishing the 4-year program in just 2.5 years. He then went on to pursue his MS and ScD in Mechanical Engineering at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1978 and 1981, respectively.

Professor Leung has been a pioneering force in the development of centrifugal separation technologies for large industrial centrifuges for use in mineral and chemical processing as well as in environmental, food, and industrial applications. He has also developed a scale-up methodology known as the Leung Number. His work has been compiled into the widely-used McGraw-Hill book, "Industrial Centrifugation Technologies," published in 1998.

Professor Leung’s centrifugal technologies have been applied to biotechnologies, contributing to the production of insulin and other therapeutic drugs for cancer and drug intermediates. His 2007 Academic-Press book, "Centrifugal Separation Technologies for Biotechnology," has become a widely-referenced resource in the biotechnology and biopharmaceutical fields. In response to popular demand, a second edition of this book was published in 2020.

In addition, Professor Leung has used his expertise in nanotechnologies developing innovative air filters capable of removing airborne particulates as small as 20 nanometers, surpassing the capabilities of traditional filter technologies. He has also developed filters to remove airborne viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, which is responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic. He has invented electrostatically charged nanofibers with applications to filter effectively airborne viruses and pollutants through the carried charges on the fibers. During the pandemic, he has written a book entitled, “Nanofiber Filter Technologies for filtration of Submicron Aerosols and Nanoaerosols”, published by Elsevier in 2021.

Professor Leung has furthermore advanced energy applications by producing nanofibers for dye-sensitized and perovskite solar cells, improving light harvesting and electron transfer. In healthcare, he has created chitosan nanofibers for tissue engineering and wound dressing.

Last but not least, innovation is at the core of Professor Leung's work, evidenced by his 55 United States patents and numerous international patents obtained since 1993. A true leader in his field, he has served as the Chairman of the 9th World Filtration Congress in New Orleans in 2004 and the 13th World Filtration Congress in San Diego in 2022, making him the first person to chair two World Filtration Congresses.