Professor Benjamin Wan-sang Wah is the provost and Wei Lun Professor of Computer Science and Engineering, the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
In 1985-2009, he was the Franklin W. Woeltge Endowed Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. In 2008-2009, he also served as Director of the Advanced Digital Sciences Center in Singapore, a US$50 million research center established by the University of Illinois in Singapore in collaboration with the Singapore government’s Agency for Science, Technology and Research. In 1998–1999, Wah was Professor of Computer Science and Engineering at The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), and in that year received an Exemplary Teaching Award. From 1999 to 2003, he served as Adjunct Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at CUHK.
Wah was born in Hong Kong and graduated from Queen Elizabeth School, Hong Kong. He received his BS and MS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Columbia University, USA, then furthered his studies at the University of California, Berkeley, obtaining an MS in Computer Science and a PhD in Engineering. Wah began his teaching career as Assistant Professor in Purdue University in 1979. He later joined the University of Illinois in 1985, which he has served until now. Wah is an expert in non-linear programming, multimedia signal processing and artificial intelligence. He has published numerous research articles in well-known professional journals such as Artificial Intelligence, IEEE Trans. in Computers, IEEE Trans. on Knowledge and Data Engineering, IEEE Trans. on Multimedia, IEEE Trans. on Parallel and Distributed Technology and IEEE Trans. on Software Engineering. He is also the author of two books, and Editor-in-Chief of Wiley’s Encyclopedia of Computer Science and Engineering, and has contributed to many edited books and book chapters. He has served on many journal editorial boards. Professor Wah has received numerous honors and awards for his distinguished academic and professional achievements, including the IEEE Computer Society Tsutomu Kanai Award, the IEEE Computer Society W. Wallace McDowell Award, the IEEE Computer Society Richard E. Merwin Distinguished Service Award, the Pan Wen Yuan Foundation Outstanding Research Award, the Web Intelligence Consortium Outstanding Contribution Award and the IEEE Third Millennium Medal. He has been elected
He also holds many Endowed Professorships and Honorary Professorships in leading universities in the United States of America and in Asia. Professor Wah was President-Elect and President of IEEE Computer Society during the years 2000–2001. He has been a member of the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong since July 2005 and Chairman of its Engineering Panel since 2006