Prof. Yu Guocong from Tianjin University (TJU), academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences and renowned chemical expert, passed away in Tianjin at 12:00 on April 6, 2022, at the age of 100. Leaving gently, the personage had devoted his life to China’s scientific research and education.
Yu Guocong, born in November 1922 in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, graduated from the Department of Chemical Engineering of National South-West Associated University in 1943. Since 1945, he has studied for a master’s degree at the University of Michigan and a doctor’s degree at the University of Pittsburgh. After graduation, he taught at the University of Pittsburgh and was selected as a member of American Scientists in 1950. Confronting numerous obstacles, he returned to the motherland resolutely in the same year. As one of the first returned scholars from the U.S., Yu worked in the Chemical Engineering Department of TJU in 1952, and joined the China Association for the Promotion of Democracy in 1953. In 1991, he was elected an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Yu is the founder of China’s rectification and separation discipline, the pioneer of modern industrial rectification technology, and the trailblazer of chemical separation engineering science. Long engaged in chemical separation science and engineering research, he has implemented systematic and groundbreaking works in the basic research, achievement transformation and industrialization of rectification technology. He surmounted key difficulties in heavy water separation through his relatively comprehensive theory of unsteady-state distillation and the “two-tower method” for heavy water concentration, and thus significantly contributed to China’s scientific development. In response to the urgency of China’s economic development, Yu flung himself into the research on the new technology of large-scale industrial distillation column, laid the theoretical foundation for modern rectification technology, and formed the “high-efficiency packed tower technology with new tower internals”. With his efforts, the monopoly of foreign technology was entirely broken, followed by the leapfrog development of China’s petrochemical industry. As for the fundamental study of chemical engineering, his “Yu-Coull” equation of the theory of the relationship between vapor-liquid equilibrium composition and temperature paved an innovative way for the computational mass transfer, and led to the development of the chemical separation discipline.
As a distinguished educator and one of the first batch of doctoral supervisors in China, Yu Guocong has cultivated nearly 100 doctoral students and postgraduates, and has conveyed a large number of professionals to the chemical industry in China. He has gained many grand prizes, such as the National Science Conference Award, the National Prize for Progress in Science and Technology, the Prize for Scientific and Technological Progress of the Ho Leung Ho Lee Foundation, the First Prize of National Teaching Achievements, and the National Labor Medal, as well as honorary titles like the National Outstanding Scientific Research Worker and Special Model Worker of Tianjin.
This brilliant researcher had been bearing in mind his promise to Premier Zhou Enlai during his 1959 visit to TJU. “To bring honor not only to myself, but also to my great motherland,” became his life motto since then. He was determined to pass on such spirit to encourage more youngsters.
Also, a conscientious teacher, Yu Guocong stood on the platform of the innovative undergraduate course “Development and Innovation of Chemical Engineering” even at the age of 85, instructed doctoral students at 90, and adhered to the writing of theory books at 97. He wished the youth talents to “boast the lofty ambition to serve our nation”, and “keep pegging away at each daily task”.
By: Han Shiyu
Editor: Qin Mian
