York and Nanjing celebrate academic links
As part of York’s 50th Anniversary celebrations, a delegation from the University of York visited the University of Nanjing, one of our partners in the Worldwide Universities Network.
The ‘York-Nanjing Day’, was part of International Academic Week at Nanjing University, and featured the two universities renewing their memorandum of understanding which formalises their institutional links. It also included lectures from York academics on British medieval history and on music technology.
It also included the formal opening of the universities’ joint spintronics centre, led by Professor Rong Zhang, of Nanjing, and Professor Yongbing Xu, of the Department of Electronics at York. Nanjing and York have been collaborating on nano-technology research for a number of years and the ceremony marked the formal opening of the research centre into spintronics.
Spintronics uses electron spin as well as charge to manipulate information processing circuits. Spintronic devices combine the advantages of magnetic materials and semi-conductors, and are likely to be stable, versatile fast and capable of simultaneous date storage as well as being energy-efficient.
The Head of the Department of Electronics at York, Professor David Howard also gave a lecture on the synthesis of the human voice.
History was the other focus of York-Nanjing Day with a major lecture by Professor Mark Ormrod on York’s place in British History. York historians spent two intensive research days with History colleagues holding discussions about the establishment of a joint centre.
The links between York and Nanjing go beyond the academic, however. In May, two chefs from Nanjing will visit York following the success of the trip to Nanjing by York’s Executive Chef Andrew Wood and his deputy Ian Dickson last year.
Further information