HKUST Civil Engineering Students Triumph as Champions at IDEERS 2025 in Taiwan, China
Under the supervision of Professor Yuxin Pan, a team of undergraduate students from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CIVL) at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) — Team Leader: HUANG Chung Kan, and members LAU Ka Keung, YU Ka Ming, and HO Hinci — has achieved an outstanding victory, winning First Prize (Champion) among all 49 international teams at the Introducing and Demonstrating Earthquake Engineering Research in Schools (IDEERS) 2025 competition held in Tainan, Taiwan, China.
The team’s success is the result of five months of dedicated preparation, during which they designed and tested over 10 different specimens and endured countless failures in the laboratory before perfecting their final model. Their persistence, innovation, and teamwork culminated in a design that stood out among international competitors and brought the championship title back to HKUST for the first time in a decade.
Organized by the National Center for Research on Earthquake Engineering (NCREE), the IDEERS competition aims to inspire creativity and innovation in earthquake engineering among students worldwide. The 2025 challenge required participants to construct a tower structure with a single load platform, representing structures such as water tanks and telecommunication towers. Teams were given only on-site materials—wooden sticks, string, and glue—to design and build their models.
During the second day of the competition, the models were tested on NCREE’s shaking table, where they were subjected to progressively stronger artificial earthquakes, reaching up to 800 gal Peak Ground Acceleration (PGA). The HKUST team achieved the highest capability-price (CP) ratio, not only outperforming all other teams in 2025 but also surpassing the performance of last year’s champion.
The Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering extends its heartfelt congratulations to Professor Pan and his students for their remarkable achievement, unwavering dedication, and for bringing international recognition to HKUST.
For more details about the IDEERS 2025 competition, please visit: https://www.ncree.org/ideers/2025/
