Work on a new research type of technological university under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), the leading national scientific institution in natural sciences and high-tech development in China, was started in Guangming District on Friday.
The new CAS Shenzhen University of Technology will begin enrolling students in September 2021.
According to the blueprint, the 560,000-square-meter university will be a top-level independent university based on the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology (SIAT) of CAS.
Its temporary transitional campus, covering 95,000 square meters, will be put into operation in the first half of 2021.
The university will focus on cultivating talented people in six disciplines — biomedicine, synthetic biology, brain science, biopharmacy, robotics and AI and advanced electronic materials. It will form disciplinary systems in science, engineering, medicine and management by 2025.
The university will create a trinity operation mode by integrating schools, research institutes and colleges, which will play their respective roles in education, research and the overall development of students.
It will highlight the convergence of education, technology and industry, mechanism innovation, and cooperation with the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and the rest of the world.
Jointly established by CAS and the Shenzhen government in 2006, SIAT is the first R&D entity in China specializing in modernized manufacturing and independent innovation with integrated technologies as its disciplinary orientation.
At the 22nd China Hi-Tech Fair that ended in the city a week ago, Fan Jianping, president of SIAT and director of the preparatory office of the new university, said the new university is a further expansion of SIAT which has been developed in Shenzhen over the past 14 years. It will be deeply integrated with SIAT.
Among the 4,000 employees at SIAT, 700 are professionals returning from overseas, including around 300 postgraduate supervisors. The research of the institute covers biomedicine engineering, brain science, synthetic biology and IT. Over 825 postdoctoral fellowships and 9,000 postgraduate students from 20 countries and regions have graduated from the institute. It has established exchanges and cooperation with research institutes and universities in 34 countries and regions.