Recently, winners of the 7^th “Contribution Award for Returned Overseas Chinese” have been announced. A total of 104 individuals, including academicians of Chinese Academy of Engineering and Chinese Academy of Sciences, are among the list, including 38 winners of the first prize. Professor Song Yongduan from Chongqing University is one of the first prize winners, and is also the only overseas Chinese in Chongqing that has won this award. Upon invitation of All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese, Professor Song Yongduan has attended the award ceremony held at the Great Hall of People, Beijing on June 15, 2018.

Professor Song is one of the first experts recruited under the “Recruitment Program of Global Experts” of China, and a specially invited expert of China. He has been engaged in theoretical and applied research of advanced control for nearly 20 years, and has directed more than 10 large-scale scientific research projects funded by NSF, DOE, ONR and NASA as the director. When Premier Zhu Rongji visited the USA , Song was one of the overseas scholars met by Premier Zhu. After returning to China , Song has successively directed key projects funded by the National Natural Sciences Foundation, projects under the 973 Program and 863 Program of the Ministry of Science and Technology and other enterprise projects. He founded Chongqing Branch of Computational Intelligence Society of IEEE and acted as the first chairman. He also founded the Key Lab for “Smart Unmanned System” of Chongqing, and has acted as the organizer and chairman of various international authoritative academic conferences and chairman of the procedure committee or general chairman of conferences. In 2017, Song was elected as one of the 11 editorial board members of IEEE Trans. on Automatic Control, a top journal in the control area (as the only one member in China).

Since 2012 when he became dean of the School of Automation of Chongqing University, Song has been playing an important leading role in disciplinary development, talent introduction and cultivation, scientific research and international cooperation. Professor Song Yongduan advocates combination of theory and practice, and is dedicated to theoretical and applied innovation. With his guidance, his team has made considerable achievements in innovation and research of automation technology, robots and smart unmanned system. The related research findings have been applied successfully in important industrial and military areas. The intelligent prototypes developed by the team include welcome robots, intelligent snow sweeping robots, intelligent calligraphy/sculpturing robots, tunnel cable patrolling UAV, automatic dispensing robot of traditional Chinese medicines, and automatic target searching and attacking robots used in battlefield. The research findings have even been reported by CCTV.

The Contribution Award for Returned Overseas Chinese was founded in 2003 by All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese. It is a national award and the winners are selected by a panel of judges made up of academicians as organized by All-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese and Chinese Academy of Sciences. It is held once every two years. The purpose of the award is to display and commend achievements made by newly returned overseas Chinese in entrepreneurship and innovation in China , and inspire more high-level returned overseas Chinese talents to serve China in various ways.

The candidates for the award are top talents in the overseas Chinese circle, particularly the newly returned overseas Chinese that have made considerable contributions or significant achievements in areas such as scientific research, technological R&D, and scientific and technological achievement dissemination, newly returned overseas Chinese working for colleges and universities, scientific research institutes, enterprises and public institutions, newly returned overseas Chinese who are starting a business independently, specially invited experts of the overseas Chinese federations, I&E bases founded by newly returned overseas Chinese and members of the Entrepreneurship & Innovation Federation of Newly Returned Overseas Chinese.