Dr. Hongtao Yu, Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Professor of Chemistry at Morgan State University, obtained his Bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the University of Science and Technology of China and Master’s degree from the Institute of Chemistry of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Then he went to Germany and obtained a Doctoral degree in bioorganic chemistry from the Technical University of Munich in 1990. After graduation, he came to the U.S. and did postdoctoral fellowships at Louisiana State University and the University of Texas at Austin. In 1996, he became an assistant professor of chemistry at Jackson State University and promoted to associate professor in 2002 and full professor in 2007. He served as Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Jackson State University starting in 2003 until 2016, when he moved to Morgan State University to serve as the Dean of the School of Computer, Mathematical and Natural Sciences. He became the Provost at Morgan State University in 2021.

For the five plus years’ service as Dean of the School of Computer, Mathematical and Natural Sciences, he was able to increase its enrollment by 60% and external funding five-fold. While serving as Chair of the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at Jackson State University, he guided the Department to Top three national programs awarding BS, MS, and PhD chemistry degrees to African Americans and top 75 Chemistry Departments nationally for federal funding.

Dr. Yu served as the President of the Mississippi Academy of Sciences in 2015-2016 and received numerous awards:
• “James C. Jones Humanitarian Award” by the National Technical Association, 2021
• “Diversity of Excellence Award” by the Mississippi State Board of Trustees of the Institutions of Higher Learning, 2016
• “HBCU Pioneer Award” by the National Organization for the Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers, 2015
• “Outstanding Contribution to Science” by the Mississippi Academy of Sciences, 2014
• “Stanley C. Israel Award” by the American Chemical Society, 2011

Dr. Yu is an elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a top 2% scientist in the world with 150 plus peer-reviewed articles. His research includes chemical toxicology, environmental chemistry, nanoscience, and photochemistry. He has been an invited speaker by over 50 universities in the U.S. and abroad.