Chancellor's Fellowships, Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering
I’m a lecturer and Chancellor’s Fellow in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering since July 2019. I have a PhD degree in Aerospace Engineering from the Delft University of Technology, the Netherlands. I’m from China and I have studied and worked in different countries before moving to Glasgow to start my professional career here. My research focuses on space exploration, in particular on analytical and numerical simulations about satellite’s motion around a celestial body, in terms of robust mission design, uncertainty analysis, and artificial intelligence-assisted navigation.
Strathclyde has a good international reputation in space-related research and a sizeable space cluster, with interesting topics to work on – and excellent colleagues. I’m well supported by my working group, the Aerospace Center of Excellence. The space cluster here has collaborations with the space industry, which provides channels for academia to interact with and to apply the research to real applications. I also enjoy the international and multi-cultural working and studying environment. I like the Scottish culture and find the people here warm.
For my career plan for the coming few years’, I am expected to build my own research group. I need to be more efficient and have a better time management by making a good balance between my manager’s role and the researcher’s role. In addition, networking and collaboration with external and internal partners need to be built up. To support this journey, Strathclyde funded me to participate in the Aurora leadership programme, which is Advance HE's leadership development initiative for women to address the under-representation of women in leadership positions in the sector. This programme helps me by exploring four key areas associated with leadership success: Identity, Impact & Voice, Core Leadership, Politics & Influence and Adaptive Leadership Skills, which are essential to achieve my future career aims.
Strathclyde is an inclusive place for high calibre academics to advance their careers, regardless of gender and ethnicity, and in a range of fields.
Diversity and inclusion means equality, opportunity and support to me. With people from different academic and cultural backgrounds together, more innovative and creative ideas could be generated due to the multi-perspective communications and interactions. University of Strathclyde is committed to achieving and promoting equality of opportunity in its learning, teaching, research and working environments, and to ensuring these environments support positive relations between people, and a culture of respect. SU values the diversity of the staff and students and are committed to encouraging everyone to realize their full potential. For example, its global talent program recruits academics from all sections of the community, particularly those who can advance the Athena Swan activity, which inspires the representation and advancement of women in higher education. Its STEM Equals Project aims to address challenges faced by female and LGBT staff in science and engineering.
For me, the pandemic affected my work due to the isolation from normal in face communication with colleagues and friends, which reduced the productivity and efficiency of my research work in terms of publication and funding application. During the pandemic, University of Strathclyde has supported staff member’s work by providing access to working equipment and arranging the meeting-free Fridays which helps people with caring responsibilities.