Professor Leo Poon

[Tabita Knezevic]

Theprofessorship honors the legacy of Leonard W. Poon, Distinguished Research Professor and Director of the Institute of Gerontology at the College of Public Health, 1985-2011. During his tenure, Poon initiated and led university, state, national, and international programs that placed the University of Georgia in the forefront of public health and aging.

Renzi-Hammond has received over $4 million in extramural research funding as a principal investigator or co-PI, from diverse funding sources, including the National Institutes of Health, private industry, state contracts and community foundations. As senior or key personnel, Renzi-Hammond has participated in sponsored research projects totaling more than $20 million.

A staunch advocate of team science, Renzi-Hammond has led the College in engagement with University programs to strengthen her skills and relationships with faculty across campus. Most notably, she served in the second L2-IRT leading large teams cohort, as well as the inaugural Rural Engagement Working Group for Academic Faculty. In 2023, with her CARE Center teammates, she earned the Team Impact Award from the UGA Office of the Vice President for Research, which recognizes a team for excellence in innovative and impactful scholarship.

Dr. Wing W. Poon is an associate professor in the Department of Accounting, Law, and Taxation. Currently, he teaches courses in Intermediate Accounting and Advanced Accounting. His research interests are in Financial Reporting, International Accounting Standards, and Taxation. Publishing of his works can be found in the Franklin Business and Law Journal, Journal of Business & Economics Research, National Accounting Journal among many others.

Prof. Poon obtained his PhD from Imperial College London. He is currently a chair professor and director of the Research Centre for Environmental Technology and Management at the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department. He has been a Changjiang Scholar Chair Professor since 2017. Prof. Poon specializes in the research and development of environmental-friendly construction materials, waste management, waste recycling technologies, and sustainable construction. He has published over 350 papers in international journals. He is a fellow of the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers (HKIE), past chairman of the HKIE Environmental Division and past representative of the HKIE Environmental Discipline. He is also a fellow of the Hong Kong Concrete Institute (HKCI) and is currently the president of HKCI. He has served on the Advisory Council on the Environment (ACE) and the Council for Sustainable Development, and is currently a member of the advisory committee for the Recycling Fund of the Hong Kong SAR Government.

Dr. Wilson Poon is an assistant professor in the Department of Metallurgical, Materials and Biomedical Engineering at UTEP. Dr. Poon received his PhD from University of Toronto (Canada) in the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, investigating the organ- and cellular-level barriers to nanoparticle delivery in vivo. Following that, he was awarded an NSERC postdoctoral fellowship for post-doctoral training in RNA biology and gene editing at the University of California San Francisco in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology. He has published peer-reviewed academic papers in journals such as Nature Materials, Nature Nanotechnology, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA), and ACS Nano. He is a member of the American Chemical Society (ACS) and the Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES). His research expertise is in understanding how materials science and biology inform nanoparticle-based drug carrier design and delivery systems engineering. In his spare time, he enjoys swimming, powerlifting, and photography.

Dr. Poon is the Training Director of the Clinical Health Psychology Pre-Doctoral Internship Program at Nebraska Medicine; and an adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry at UNMC. She is board certified in geropsychology. Her interests include aging and life transitions, caregiving, end-of-life care, grief, and coping with chronic and life-limiting health conditions.

Throughout my research and career, I have seen that HIV and other communicable diseases affect certain socioeconomic groups disproportionately. I am passionate about serving these vulnerable populations and understanding the social impact of these medical illnesses.

In addition to caring for patients, I am also passionate about teaching. I enjoy working with residents and guiding their learning. Prior to joining Memorial, I worked at Florida Atlantic University where I served as an assistant professor of clinical biomedical science, associate program director of the internal medicine residency, and was director of the Resident Continuity Clinic.

I have also worked for Broward Community & Family Health Centers, where I directed the Ryan White HIV Program and served as a primary care provider for adults and children. I also am involved in research regarding quality improvement healthcare initiatives and medical treatment for patients living with HIV.

Maurice Kwong-Lai Poon is a professor in the School of Social Work at York University and Co-chair of the Advisory Research Committee at Asian Community AIDS Services. His current research focuses on gay Asian diasporic identities and politics, the social construction of violence in gay intimate relationships, and HIV/AIDS issues related to Asian men who have sex with men. He is active in the development of human services for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered Asian community in Toronto.

Thomas Poon, Ph.D., became executive vice president and provost on June 1, 2017, and leads the university's Academic Affairs and Student Affairs divisions, including overseeing the university's educational, scholarly, creative activities, student development and enrollment management areas. He is also a tenured professor of chemistry. Poon reports to the president.

Poon previously served at Pitzer College in many senior leadership positions, including interim president, acting president, and senior associate dean of faculty. He was a professor of chemistry and held tenured faculty positions at Pitzer College, Claremont McKenna College, and Scripps College, allowing him to interact with students, faculty, staff, and administrators at all three institutions. He has been a visiting scholar and assistant professor at Columbia University and was an assistant professor of chemistry at Randolph-Macon College.

He has written numerous peer-reviewed articles, including many with undergraduate co-authors. His collaborative research and analyses on the American sweetgum tree, for example, have been referenced in academic publications and extensively reported by the news media. Poon has contributed chapters and co-authored books on pedagogy and chemistry, and he is currently working on a book titled "Changing Your Narrative to Tell Your First Generation Success Story." He has received multiple grants from the National Science Foundation to investigate topics ranging from his S-STEM work in the molecular sciences, the acquisition of a nuclear magnetic resonance instrument to support teaching and research, and other projects aimed at integrating the sciences into curricula. He pioneered textbook methodologies and created hybrid-learning approaches that have been adopted by other authors and have become prevalent in teaching chemistry. His OCHEM educational website has been highlighted in the journal Science and has helped college students learn organic chemistry since 1999.

Additionally, Poon has supported, developed, and led a broad range of academic and social justice initiatives in his higher education career. Highlights include his work in study abroad, including the establishment of an exchange program in Bhutan; the development of hybrid programs in Vietnam and Brazil; the enhancement of a tropical field station in Costa Rica; and the reopening of a program in Nepal just eight months after two devastating earthquakes. He also expanded mentorship resources for first-year students and provided opportunities for incarcerated men to earn college course credits through a partnership with the California Rehabilitation Center.

Poon earned his Ph.D. in chemistry at UCLA in 1995 and his Bachelor of Science degree in 1990 at Fairfield University, a Jesuit institution. He has competed in several triathlons and marathons, including the Los Angeles, Las Vegas, New York City and Boston marathons. His personal interests include professional and Division I sports, film and cinema, and music. He plays guitar and ukulele, and he has recorded audio books for the visually impaired.

Professor Poon is a professor of the Department of Computer Science. Prior to joining Hang Seng Management College, he has worked at the University of Texas at Austin, City University of Hong Kong and Caritas Institute of Higher Education. Professor Poon received his BSc in Engineering and MPhil from the University of Hong Kong in 1989 and 1991 respectively. He finished his PhD at the University of Toronto in 1995. He is a theoretical computer scientist with great interest in applying his expertise in algorithm design to solve problems in other areas. His Erds number is 3 and he is an academic descendant of Carl Friedrich Gauss.

Dr Liu is an Associate Professor with Department of Computing, The Hang Seng University of Hong Kong (HSUHK). Before joining HSUHK, he held several academic posts at University of Ottawa and Hong Kong Baptist University. Dr Liu received PhD in Computer Science at City University of Hong Kong, and received MSc and BSc in Applied Mathematics at South China University of Technology. His research interest includes wireless networking, cloud computing, artificial intelligence and algorithm design and analysis. He has published over 80 papers in these areas. He was an Associate Editor for IEEE Transactions on Cloud Computing. His h-index is 26 according to Google Scholar.

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