The NJIT Board of Overseers is proud to award Dr. Haimin Wang, distinguished professor of physics, its eighth annual Excellence in Research Prize and Medal.
Wang received his B.S. from Nanjing University in 1982 and obtained his Ph.D. under the supervision of Professor Hal Zirin of Caltech in 1988, with research at Big Bear Solar Observatory. In 1995, he joined NJIT as an assistant professor and was promoted to associate professor in 1997, professor with tenure in 2000 and distinguished professor in 2004.
He has served as a referee for funding agencies such as NSF and NASA and major journals such as Nature, Astrophysical Journal and the Journal of Geophysical Research and on the science advisory committees for major instruments such as SOLIS and DKIST in the U.S. and the 8-m giant solar telescope in China. He has about 250 peer-reviewed journal publications with over 6,000 citations and has graduated over 20 Ph.D. students. He also has trained over 20 post-docs, 10 of whom obtained tenure-track faculty positions in several countries and four of whom were winners of the prestigious NSF CAREER Award.
Wang played a crucial role in NJITs acquisition of BBSO from Caltech in 1997 and subsequent research efforts. He has obtained over 60 federal grants totaling over $25 million as a PI or Co-PI and has been funded as a Guest Investigator of all recent major solar-related NASA missions: CGRO, Yohkoh, SOHO, TRACE, RHESSI, Hinode, STEREO and SDO.
Haimin Wang is a leading expert in observational solar flare research with a focus on the areas of evolution of magnetic fields associated with flares. He is currently the Chief Scientist of Big Bear Solar Observatory (BBSO) and Director of the Space Weather Research Lab in the Center for Solar-Terrestrial Research.
In 2013, Wang was appointed by NASA to lead the funded Living with a Star Flare Focus Team, involving scientists from Stanford, NASA and NCAR. He also headed an international network containing nine observatories to monitor the Sun 24 hours a day in Hydrogen Alpha, a key international facility in space weather research.