PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Francis Y.L. Chin

Professor Chin is a computer scientist whose work connects bioinformatics with machine translation. He earned degrees at Toronto and Princeton, taught at five universities, and joined HKU in 1985 as founding head of its Department of Computer Science. He coauthored the IDBA genome-assembler paper, and his HKU bioinformatics team received RECOMB's 2022 Test-of-Time Award. DeepTranslate began in 2018 with an AI deep-learning team led by Chin and Bethany Chan; as of October 2026, he is an Emeritus & Honorary Professor at HKU and the company's Founder and Chief Solution Officer.

Now at
University of Hong Kong and DeepTranslate
Badges

Timeline

  1. 1972–1985

    Education and early teaching

    He earns a B.A.Sc. at the University of Toronto in 1972, then M.S., M.A. and Ph.D. degrees at Princeton from 1974 to 1976. Before joining HKU in 1985, he teaches at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County; the University of California, San Diego; the University of Alberta; the Chinese University of Hong Kong; and the University of Texas at Dallas.

  2. 1985–1999

    Founding HKU Computer Science

    He joins HKU in 1985 and leads its Department of Computer Science as founding head through December 31, 1999.

  3. 2002–2014

    Associate deanships at HKU

    He serves as Associate Dean of the Graduate School from 2002 to July 2006. From 2007 through December 2014, he serves as Associate Dean of HKU's Faculty of Engineering.

  4. 2010

    IDBA genome assembly

    With Yu Peng, Henry C.M. Leung and S.M. Yiu, he coauthors IDBA, an iterative de Bruijn graph de novo assembler presented at RECOMB in 2010.

  5. 2018

    DeepTranslate's AI team

    DeepTranslate is established in 2018 with an AI deep-learning specialist team headed by Prof. Francis Chin and Dr. Bethany Chan.

  6. 2022

    The RECOMB Test-of-Time Award

    In 2022, the HKU bioinformatics team that includes him receives RECOMB's Test-of-Time Award for the IDBA paper published in RECOMB 2010.

  7. October 2025

    A panel on workplace AI

    In October 2025, he joins HKITF's NextGen Innovations panel on AI, cybersecurity and smart-office technology.

  8. As of October 2026

    HKU and DeepTranslate roles

    As of October 2026, he is an Emeritus & Honorary Professor at HKU and the Founder and Chief Solution Officer of DeepTranslate. The company serves financial clients with AI translation for English and Chinese domains.

Career

  1. Since 2018DeepTranslateFounder, Chief Solution Officer
  2. Since 1985University of Hong KongFounding head of the Department of Computer Science, Associate Dean of the Graduate School

Education

  1. 1976Princeton UniversityM.S., M.A. and Ph.D.
  2. 1972University of TorontoB.A.Sc.

From the biography.

  1. 11% of AI doctorate holders from 2010 to 2016 founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduationIncludes Francis Y.L. Chin. We estimate how often AI doctorate holders founded or led a company or lab by 10 years after graduation, how waiting times compare between founders and top jobs, and which universities trained the most.
  2. More people shaping AI studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology than at any other institutionIncludes University of Hong Kong. We estimate where the people shaping AI studied and where their careers led. Massachusetts Institute of Technology leads with 467 former students, including 291 recorded doctorates.
  3. The company share of AI researchers’ top papers was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974Includes University of Hong Kong. We estimate where the people shaping AI worked when their most-cited papers appeared: the company share was 31% in 2020–2024 and 8% in 1970–1974, and Google led all organizations in 2020–2024.
  4. Google has the highest combined h-index among AI organizationsIncludes University of Hong Kong. We estimate that Google holds the highest combined h-index at 8,016, while universities account for 73% of the deduplicated total across AI organizations.

Colleagues

People with dated positions at the same organization in the same years.

Sources and credits

Photo: We have no published photo of Francis Y.L. Chin yet. Send us a free-licensed photo.

  1. Chin, F.Y.L. cs.hku.hk. Checked 21 October 2026.
  2. HKU Faculty of Engineering E-News web.engg.hku.hk. Checked 21 October 2026.
  3. About Us - deeptranslate.hk deeptranslate.hk. Checked 21 October 2026.
  4. RECOMB 2022 Test-of-Time Award cs.hku.hk. Checked 21 October 2026.
  5. NextGen AI Smart Office Conference Recap | AiX Society aixsociety.com. Checked 21 October 2026.