Yating Wan obtained her Bachelor of Science in 2012 with a specialization in optics at Zhejiang University in China (GPA: 3.97/4.0), and received her Ph.D. (2017) in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology(GPA: 3.94/4.0), under the the supervision of Prof. Kei May Lau and Prof. John Bowers.
She was selected as the winner of the School of Engineering PhD Research Excellence Award 2016-17 in HKUST, received 2021 CLEO Tingye Li Innovation Prize, 2018 PIERS Young Scientist Award , nominated as the Rising Stars Women in Engineering award by the 2018 Asian Dean’s Forum, and the Rising Stars 2020 Academic Career award for Women in EECS, for her pioneering work in integration of long wavelength quantum dot lasers on Si substrates.
She has published 35(22 as first author) high quality peer-reviewed journal papers and 22 international peer-reviewed conferences proceedings (9 as first author). She is the first author of 1 book chapter (her chapter is also selected as the book cover), 5 cover journal (Optica, Laser & Photonics Review (twice), Photonics Research and Applied Physics Letter), 3 invited talk (2018 CLEO, 2018 PIERS, and 2018 ACP), and one postdeadline conference paper (2017 CLEO). Her work has been cited 1318 times in other peer-reviewed journal articles (Google Scholar Citations: 1318, h-index: 20) and has received extensive recognition by more than 30 professional communities and 10 social media coverage.
She is now a Postdoctoral fellow at of University of California, Santa Barbara in Prof. John Bowers' group, to develop quantum dot lasers for low threshold and high efficiency, photodetectors, modulators and photonic integrated circuits.
Her feature story was reported by a biannual online PG Newsletter in HKUST.