With funds from state departments concerned, Tsinghua University has been busy with construction of three villas recently. Chen Ning Yang, the Nobel laureate in physics and physicist of world renown, and Lin Jiaqiao, famous American Chinese applied mathematician, will settle in two of the three villas. And Tsung Dao Lee, who shared the Nobel Prize for Physics with Chen Ning Yang in 1957 and has received numerous other honors and awards, will possibly be the third owner.

According to experts, the settlement of the scientists will help improve the academic level of Tsinghua University. Furthermore, the personal charms of the scientists will certainly produce far-reaching impact on the college students in their behaviors and studies.

About the three villas

The three villas, located amid a grove in Tsinghua's central area, have a quiet and graceful environment and are convenient for life. The villas are three two-storey buildings, each with a floorspace of some 300 square meters (359 square yards), designed by the School of Architecture, Tsinghua University. The buildings, especially equipped with elevators, also the best dwellings in Tsinghua by far, will be basically completed by the end of this month.

About the three scientists

The three scientists Chen Ning Yang, Lin Jiaqiao, and Tsung Dao Lee, all graduated from Tsinghua University, have made world-known academic achievements after they went study abroad in the 1940s. And they were successively invited to be honorary professors of Tsinghua since the 1980s.

Prof. Yang has spent large efforts to help to establish the Center of Advance Study at Tsinghua after his retirement. He regards it as his most important career for the rest of his life. Currently, Prof. Yang lives in Tsinghua for some four months every year.

Great significance

Education experts pointed out that the first-level foreign universities always invite best talents throughout the world and introduce the most advanced through academic exchanges. The world-level master is an absolutely necessary for a university. Therefore, the Chinese universities must be advanced not only in academic level, but also in study method and moral character for realizing their dreams of training Nobel laureates.

(People's Daily April 11, 2002)