Special Issue for Functional Nanomaterials for Sustainable Development: The Tenth Anniversary of the “Cross‐Strait Workshop on Nanoscience & Technology”

Nanoscience and Nanotechnology in China is a rapidly expanding and dynamic field, receiving extensive attention and growing funding from both government and industry over the past two decades. The Cross-Strait Workshop on NanoScience & Technology was proposed by celebrated scholars of nanoscience and technology from Taiwan, Hongkong, and Mainland China, launched by Prof. Sishen Xie, Prof. Mow-Kuen Wu and Prof. Shuit-Tong Lee, and initiated in 2002. Since then, ten workshops have been held successfully in Urumqi, Guiyang, HK, Taiwan, Hulunbeier, etc., focusing mainly on the latest research and development of nanoscience and technology in China. The program covers a wide range of topics including nanomaterials, nanoscience and technology for energy, biomedicine, the environment, as well as chemical, mechanical, electronics and optoelectronics areas; functionalization, surface modification, and the chemistry of nanomaterials; processing and characterization of nanomaterials; control and manipulation of nanostructures; theoretical modeling and computation simulation. Up to now, more than 700 scientists have been invited, with 30 keynote speeches as well as more than 400 invited talks. The tenth Cross-Strait Workshop on Nanoscience & Technology was hosted by the National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, with more than 80 participants. Fifty-six of them contributed to this special issue. Finally, a total of 11 Review articles, 1 Concept, 13 Full Papers, and 7 Communications have been accepted for publication in this special issue. We sincerely hope that you will enjoy this special issue dedicated to the tenth anniversary of the Cross-Strait Workshop on Nanoscience & Technology. This serial workshop is a strong and powerful bridge of discussion, communication, and cooperation between Taiwan, HK, and Mainland China in the field of nanoscience and technology, and we look forward to its further growth from toddler to full youth over the next decade. Zhiyong Tang obtained his PhD in 1999 from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. After that, he went to the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, and the University of Michigan for his postdoctoral research. In November of 2006, he joined the National Centre for Nanoscience and Technology (NCNST) and took a full professor position. Zhiyong Tang's research interests are focused on the fabrication and application of inorganic nanomaterials in the fields of energy and the environment. Sishen Xie got his PhD in 1983 from the institute of physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). His research interests cross many fields of condensed matter physics, including rare earth alloys, High-Tc superconductors, and nanoscale materials, especially 1D materials. He received a first class Chinese National Nature Awards prize for the discovery of High-Tc superconductors in 1989, and a third class prize for his research on these materials in 1991. He became a CAS member in 2003 and an academician of the Third World Academy of Sciences in 2004. Maw-Kuen Wu completed his PhD at the University of Houston in 1981. After two years as a research scientist he became an assistant professor of physics at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, and was promoted to professor in 1987 to recognize his discovery of superconductivity above 77 K in YBCO. He then moved to the National Tsing Hua University, conducting further research in high-temperature superconductivity. Prof. Wu serves as both the Distinguished Research Fellow of the Institute of Physics at the Academia Sinica and the President of the National Dong Hwa University.