Career Summary (for detail see CV)
Professor Yuen received a BA degree with a double major in Math/Physics in 1972, a master degree in Physics in 1974 and a Ph.D degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1977, all from UC Berkeley. From 1977 to 2010, Professor Yuen conducted his teaching/research and served as Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB). Adminstratively, he also served as Vice Chair and then Chair of the Academic Senate at UCSB from 1999 to 2007.
In 2009, he joined the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) as a special assistance to the President with a title of “Strategic Specialist”. In April 2010, he was appointed Vice President (Academic Development) after a worldwide search. He stepped down from the position of Vice President (Academic Development) in October 31, 2012. He stayed at PolyU as Chair Professor of Thermal Science and Engineering until June 2015, when he returned to the US.
He is now Professor Emeritus of Mechanical engineering at UCSB and starting in Fall, 2016, he will also be a lecturer at the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Santa Clara University.
Research Experience (for detail see Research)
Professor Yuen’s research interest is in the areas of radiation heat transfer, fire safety, ,high heat flux electronic cooling and two phase flow in nuclear reactor safety. His research has been funded by NSF, NRC, DOE and NASA. He has published over one hundred and twenty refereed technical papers.
In radiation heat transfer, Professor Yuen has devoted his career to the development of solution methods to simulate radiation heat transfer in a complex combustion environment. He originated the concept of the generalized zonal method (GZM), scattering mean beam length, and the multiple absorption coefficient zonal method (MACZM). He developed RAD-NNET, a neural network to calculate the absorption and emission of a real combustion CO2/H2O/soot mixture (available on website http://radnnet-wyuen.appspot.com/). He is currently working on a neural network based zonal method, which can be implemented in CFD codes to accurately simulate the effect of radiation heat transfer in a multi-dimensional combustion environment.
In fire safety, Professor Yuen has focused his work on the effective of radiation on fire related phenomena such as flashover and flame spread. He also did work on using the Monte Carlo method for fire safety designs.
In the area of electronic cooling, Professor Yuen’s work had focused on the use of phase change material and high thermal conductivity foam to generate high heat flux cooling for electronic devices. Using graphite foam, he and his colleagues developed a Supercooler for an optoelectronic package operating with a heat flux of 400 W/cm2. He has also published works on heat transfer enhancement for conventional heat exchangers using pin fins and phase change material.
In two phase flow, Professor Yuen has worked in the area of steam explosion with application to nuclear reactor safety. In additional to publishing extensively, he is the principle author of two DOE computer codes PM-ALPHA and ESPROSE.m, developed for the simulation of the premixing and explosion dynamics of a steam explosion.
Teaching Experience (for detail see Teaching)
Professor Yuen has over 40 years of teaching experience at the university level, for 34 years at UCSB and 5 years at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU). He has taught classes both at the undergraduate and graduate level, in areas of thermodynamics, fluid mechanics and heat transfer. In 1980, he received the Ralph Teetor Award from the Society of Automotive Engineering in recognition for his excellence in teaching. At PolyU, he has taught classes in Service Learning, taking students to service projects in Cambodia, Myanmar and Rwanda. He also developed and implemented eLearning materials in a Fluid Mechanics class at PolyU in 2015. Currently, he is teaching undergraduate fluid mechanics and heat transfer classes and graduate radiation heat transfer classes at Santa Clara University.
University Management at UCSB
Professor Yuen was involved in all aspects of the operation of the University at UCSB, from curriculum development, degree granting, to faculty appointment, promotion and budgets. He served as Chair (2003-2006) and Vice Chair (1999-2002) of the Academic Senate in the UCSB. Until he retired from UCSB in 2010, he served as the Faculty Director of the Academic Senate’s Center for Faculty Outreach. As Senate Chair, he participated in the drafting and final formulation of the University’s Long Range Academic Plan 2010-2025. He has also participated actively in long term capital planning for the campus and all capital projects. During his tenure as Senate Chair, he participated in the search and appointment of various senior positions, including the Executive Vice Chancellor, Vice Chancellor of Research, academic deans and department chairs.
In his administrative responsibilities as Senate Chair, Walter oversaw the operation of the Undergraduate Council and Graduate Council which take charge of admission criteria; approval of course, new academic/graduate programmes and degrees; and award of graduate fellowships. He supervised approximately 30 academic programme reviews during his tenure as Vice Chair and Chair of the Academic Senate. In 2001, he chaired a Task Force to revise the General Education curriculum at UCSB. In 2002, he served as co-chair of a UC system-wide conference entitled “Rethinking the SAT”, which led to a significant revision of the SAT and also the reassessment of using the SAT test as an admission criterion by many US universities. In 2006, he chaired a work group to develop a consistent course load teaching policy for all academic departments.
University Management at HK POLYU
At PolyU, Professor Yuen, as the Vice President of Academic Development (VP(AD)), was in charge for all aspects related to the overall management of the academic program. He oversees the Academic Secretariet, which is responsible for all admission processes, student records, academic regulations and registration matters. He oversees the Student Affair Office, which is responsible for all matters related to student life, student support and scholarship programmes. Also through the Student Affair Office, the VP(AD) oversees the very important Work Integrated Education (WIE) programme, which requires every student to have some work experience prior to graduation. As VP(AD), he oversaw the successful Qualitjy Assurance Council (QAC) Audit of PolyU in 2011. The QAC-Audit gave PolyU 9 commendations and the review panel noted that “PolyU has demonstrated a long tradition of quality assurance based on a comprehensive system of reviews, accreditation processes and so on at many levels of the institution. The Panel concluded that the processes are robust and well-embedded and there is strong culture of quality assurance in the University”.
In 2012, PolyU revised its undergraduate degree from a 3-year program to a 4-year program. Professor Yuen, as VP(AD), was the senior administrative officer responsible for the transition. He led the development of the General University Requirement for the 4-year curriculum. As part of the General University Education, Professor Yuen implemented a Service Learning graduation requirement for the undergraduates. PolyU is the first major university to implement such a requirement in the world. To facilitate the implementation of the 4-yr curriculum, particularly in the area of the General University Requirement, Professor Yuen established the Office of Undergraduate Studies (OUS), together with two sub-offices, the Office of Service Learning (OSL) and the Office of General University Requirement (OGUR). In additional to provide specific curriculum development for Service Learning (OSL), these offices (OUS, OGUR) take on the important role of advising students in the planning of their 4-yr curriculum. Professor Yuen also worked with academic departments to develop an Academic Advisor system, in which every undergraduate students will be assigned to an academic staff, who will serve as his/her advisor during his/her 4-year career at the University.