‘Steel Academician’ Cui Kun, Scientist, Dies at 101
Professor Cui Kun, the renowned Chinese materials scientist and academician known as the “Steel Academician” for his pioneering work in metallurgy, passed away on June 26, 2026, at the age of 101 in Wuhan, China. A giant in China’s materials science field, Cui was celebrated for breaking foreign monopolies on high-performance mold steel and for his extraordinary personal generosity in funding scholarships for disadvantaged students.
A Journey Forged in Adversity
Born in July 1925 in Jinan, Shandong Province, Cui Kun grew up in a China ravaged by war and foreign occupation. His father, a Yenching University graduate, resigned from a foreign firm when Japan invaded Shandong — a display of national integrity that profoundly shaped the young Cui. In 1944, after high school, Cui traveled alone for 81 days across enemy lines to reach the college entrance exam in Chengdu, eventually gaining admission to the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Wuhan University.
After graduating in 1948, Cui remained at Wuhan University as a faculty member. He pursued graduate studies at the Harbin Institute of Technology and was later sent by his institution to study at the Moscow Steel Institute in the Soviet Union from 1958 to 1960, specializing in metallography and heat treatment, as reported by CCTV News.
Breaking Foreign ‘Strangleholds’ on Steel
Returning to China at a time when the nation’s industrial base was extremely weak, Cui Kun took on the mission of establishing China’s independent die steel system. High-performance mold steel — essential for manufacturing automotive parts, electronics, and aerospace components — was dominated by foreign countries, leaving China dependent on expensive imports.
Cui’s breakthrough came when he innovatively modified American matrix steel by increasing carbon content and adding niobium, a metal abundant in China. This created the world’s first niobium-bearing high-strength toughness matrix steel, which was widely adopted across China’s automotive, aerospace, and electronics industries. In the early 1980s, he developed a free-cutting mold steel for a Shanghai electronics factory that needed complex printed circuit board molds previously imported at roughly $10,000 per set. The innovation earned him the National Invention Award, Second Class, in 1985.
According to the Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST) memorial website, Cui Kun received one National Science Conference Award and four National Technology Invention Awards over his career. He was elected as an Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering in 1997.
The ‘Great Teacher’ and His Magnum Opus
At age 81, after retiring from active research, Cui Kun embarked on an extraordinary intellectual endeavor. Over seven years, he single-handedly wrote “Steel: Composition, Structure and Properties” — a comprehensive 1,574-page reference work of approximately two million Chinese characters, published by Science Press in 2013. Materials scientist Professor Gu Haicheng of Xi’an Jiaotong University called it “an encyclopedia of steel, a towering monument, an immortal masterpiece.” A third edition was completed in early 2024, and Cui submitted the fourth edition manuscript just days before his death.
As one of China’s first batch of doctoral supervisors in 1981, Cui trained generations of materials scientists who now lead research and industry across the country. HUST’s official obituary described him as a “Great Teacher” (大先生) of lofty scholarship and noble virtue.
A Life of Frugality and Generosity
Cui Kun’s personal story is marked by a striking contrast: extreme frugality paired with extraordinary generosity. He famously wore a shirt for over 30 years, refusing to replace it, saying “it can still be worn, it’s a waste to throw it away.” Yet he and his wife, Professor Zhu Huinan, sold their four-bedroom apartment and donated their entire life savings to establish the “Diligence and Inspiration Scholarship” and “Freshman Scholarship,” supporting over 1,000 financially disadvantaged students.
“I have two great joys in life,” Cui told China Youth Daily in early 2024. “One is that the scientific achievements of my youth are still being applied today; the other is that I have written this book with my life’s accumulation.”
Final Days and Legacy
In his final month, Cui Kun — already hospitalized and in declining health — discharged himself against medical advice to complete two critical tasks: submitting the fourth edition manuscript of his book to the publisher and processing donations for the Freshman Scholarship. He was re-hospitalized on June 2 and passed away peacefully at Tongji Hospital on June 26, surrounded by family, colleagues, and students.
A funeral and farewell ceremony is scheduled for June 28 at Wuchang Funeral Home in Wuhan.
Cui Kun’s century-long life — forged through war, dedicated to national scientific independence, and marked by profound personal integrity — stands as a testament to what one individual can achieve in service of both country and community. As an HUST researcher reflected, his life was like a piece of “special steel” — tempered through fierce fire, with the toughness to bear heavy loads and the clarity to be pure inside and out.