Fang Fukang (; 28 February 1935 – 4 February 2019) was a Chinese physicist and

systems scientist Systems science, also referred to as systems research or simply systems, is a transdisciplinary field that is concerned with understanding simple and complex systems in nature and society, which leads to the advancements of formal, natural, socia ...

. He established the study of

systems theory Systems theory is the Transdisciplinarity, transdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or artificial. Every system has causal boundaries, is influenced by its context, de ...

Beijing Normal University Beijing Normal University (BNU) () is a public university in Haidian, Beijing, Haidian, Beijing, China. It is affiliated with the Ministry of Education (China), Ministry of Education of China, and co-funded by the Ministry of Education and the B ...

and served as president of the university from 1989 to 1995.

Biography

Fang was born on 28 February 1935 in Shanghai,

Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

, with his ancestral home in

Dinghai Dinghai () is a district of Zhoushan City made of 128 islands in Zhejiang province, China. The total area is 1,444 square kilometres. The land area is 568.8 square kilometres, the sea area is 875.2 square kilometres, and the coastline is more th ...

, Zhejiang. He graduated from the Department of Physics of

in 1956, and researched and taught

nuclear physics Nuclear physics is the field of physics that studies atomic nuclei and their constituents and interactions, in addition to the study of other forms of nuclear matter. Nuclear physics should not be confused with atomic physics, which studies th ...

afterwards. In the 1970s, he studied at the

Université libre de Bruxelles The (French language, French, ; lit. Free University of Brussels; abbreviated ULB) is a French-speaking research university in Brussels, Belgium. It has three campuses: the ''Solbosch'' campus (in the City of Brussels and Ixelles), the ''Plain ...

in Belgium under the Nobel Prize laureate

Ilya Prigogine Viscount Ilya Romanovich Prigogine (; ; 28 May 2003) was a Belgian physical chemist of Russian-Jewish origin, noted for his work on dissipative structures, complex systems, and irreversibility. Prigogine's work most notably earned him the 19 ...

, and earned his PhD in 1980. After returning to China, he introduced Prigogine's

dissipative system A dissipative system is a thermodynamically open system which is operating out of, and often far from, thermodynamic equilibrium in an environment with which it exchanges energy and matter. A tornado may be thought of as a dissipative system. Di ...

theory to China, and established the study of

at Beijing Normal University. From May 1989 to May 1995, Fang served as president of Beijing Normal University. He also served as party secretary of the university. Fang died on 4 February 2019 in Beijing, at the age of 83.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fang, Fukang 1935 births 2019 deaths Physicists from Shanghai Beijing Normal University alumni Université libre de Bruxelles alumni Chinese expatriates in Belgium Systems scientists Presidents of Beijing Normal University Educators from Shanghai