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- Lingnan co-develops world's first large-scale AI archaeological system for ancient Chinese plant seeds
- Exploring future applications of ‘AI + wrinkled materials’ in anti-counterfeiting, artificial organs, and stretchable batteries
- AI falls short on context and cultural rhetoric and still cannot replace human interpreters
- AI autonomously taking over tasks may not reduce employees’ mental workload
- Lingnan finds critically endangered Chinese bahaba in western HKSAR waters using co-developed environmental DNA technique
- Tropical species may be near thermal limits
- RGC funding secured for 49 research projects: early-career scholars drive research success
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- Welcoming new students for 2026/27 academic year
- Campus facility upgrades: Canteen (Tai Ning Hall) with diverse cuisines and new convenience store
- Summer exchange initiatives highlight Lingnan’s innovations and global vision
- A record number of seven elite athletes admitted for new academic year
- From Pakistan to the global stage: how Seemi’s ‘Seek Discomfort’ philosophy led to Distinguished Student honours
- Master’s students curate exhibition ‘Who Cares?’, with diverse perspectives of a new generation of curators
- Six Lingnan students awarded HSBC scholarships in 2025-26
- Elite athletes excel at international track cycling and tennis events
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- Lingnan wins 16 awards at Silicon Valley International Invention Festival 2026 - tops Hong Kong universities for total and gold medals
- Lingnan reports record admissions success: ranking first in JUPAS Band A application growth for three consecutive years
- Two AI awards recognise community health and social inclusion breakthroughs
- Top Three-Star Certificate earned for the third consecutive year, plus one of Hong Kong’s Ten Outstanding Community Service Awards
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- Honours awarded to Chairman Yao and Lingnanians
- The Education View names President S. Joe Qin one of the Top 50 Visionary Education Leaders to Watch in 2026
- Canton Tower lights up to celebrate Lingnan’s World No. 1 in Quality Education
- Lingnan rises 300 places in the ShanghaiRanking’s 2026 ARWU
- AI and edTech innovations shine at Learning & Teaching Expo
- Lingnan officially unveils 60th/140th anniversary logo
RGC funding secured for 49 research projects: early-career scholars drive research success
- Research
Issue No. 197 Aug 2026
Lingnan University has secured grants for 49 research projects in the 2026/27 competitive funding rounds of the Research Grants Council (RGC), including the General Research Fund (GRF), the Early Career Scheme (ECS), and the Humanities and Social Sciences Prestigious Fellowship Scheme (HSSPFS), with total awarded funding approaching HK$27 million. Of these, 48 projects are supported under the GRF and ECS, marking a record high for Lingnan. Funding secured under the ECS alone has increased by nearly 30 per cent year-on-year, underscoring the strong research capability and academic excellence of Lingnan’s early-career scholars.
In this year’s exercise, ten projects each received funding exceeding HK$800,000, including one led by Prof S. Joe Qin, President and Wai Kee Kau Chair Professor of Data Science, entitled “Long-term Error Augmented Predictive (LEAP) Learning with Transformers for Smart Building Cooling Load Predictions”. Two further projects received funding exceeding HK$1 million: “Trustworthy Stablecoins: Coordinating Centralised and Decentralised Finance at Scale”, led by Prof Alexandru-Codru Preda, Professor of the Department of Sociology and Social Policy; and “Unravelling the Genomic Basis of Coral-Eating Phestilla Nudibranchs: Host Selection and Climate Resilience”, led by Prof Jack Ip Chi-Ho, Associate Professor (Presidential Early Career Scholar) of the Division of Science.
Lingnan also secured a substantial grant in the “Computing Science and Information Technology” subject discipline under the GRF, led by Prof Xin Yao, Vice-President (Research and Innovation) and Tong Tin Sun Chair Professor of Machine Learning, for the project entitled “Co-evolving more generalisable Parallel Algorithm portfolios with Limited training instances (CoPAL)”.
According to the RGC assessment criteria, projects scoring 4.5 or above are classified as high quality. Of the 49 funded projects awarded to Lingnan this year, 35 (71 per cent) achieved this benchmark.
Outstanding performance under the ECS
Lingnan achieved the highest success rate of the eight UGC-funded universities in the fields of Psychology and Linguistics, as well as in Physical Sciences. In Electrical and Electronic Engineering, the University ranked second in the Hong Kong SAR in terms of application success rate and total funding.
Strong results under the GRF
In the “Computing Science and Information Technology” subject discipline, Lingnan recorded a success rate of 33.3 per cent above the sector average across the eight UGC-funded universities, and in Physical Sciences a 50 per cent success rate, coming second in the Hong Kong SAR.