Associate Dean of Engineering Prof Christopher Chao, Mechanical Engineering, has been elected to the Board of Directors of the International Society of Indoor Air Quality and Climate. Prof Chao, a specialist in contaminant transport in indoor environments, will serve until 2016. He has taken on the roles of Vice President and Chair of the Technical Program Committee for the 13th International Conference of Indoor Air Quality and Climate (Indoor Air 2014) to be held at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre in July 2014. The society's flagship conference attracts over 1,000 global participants from disciplines ranging from engineering and science to public health.

In addition, a research paper by Prof Chao received a 2012 Best Paper Award from Building and Environment journal. The paper, co-authored with Prof Chao's PhD students S Yin and G N Sze-To, focuses on "Retrospective Analysis of Multi-Drug Resistant Tuberculosis Outbreak During a Flight Using Computational Fluid Dynamics and Infection Risk Assessment" (Vol 47, January 2012). In 2011, the journal received 1,195 submissions. Some 200-plus papers were accepted for publication and three were selected to receive a Best Paper Award.