‘Father of graphene’ Andre Geim leaves Britain for chair professorship at HKU

Andre Geim, the 67-year-old Nobel Prize-winning physicist known in China as the “father of graphene”, will join the University of Hong Kong as a chair professor in April, according to the university.Geim, who led a team at the University of Manchester to isolate graphene – the world’s thinnest and strongest material, consisting of a single layer of carbon atoms – using adhesive tape in 2004, is set to leave Britain after spending more than two decades of his career there.08:30Why are more Chinese scientists leaving the US to return to China?Why are more Chinese scientists leaving the US to return to China?Geim said he was drawn to Hong Kong’s distinctive East-West synergy and world-class infrastructure.“HKU’s forward-looking approach to interdisciplinary research and its commitment to supporting bold ideas creates the conditions in which great science happens,” the university quoted him as saying in a statement on Wednesday.“I’m excited to collaborate with outstanding colleagues here and to contribute to discoveries that will matter globally.”A vocal advocate of international scientific collaboration, Geim has maintained close ties with Chinese researchers and has been a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences since 2017.In an interview in October with MIT Technology Review China in Shanghai, Geim said his first PhD student in Manchester was from China. Jiang Da, now a researcher at Zhejiang University of Technology, was tasked with making graphite as thin as possible.