On the 19^th of April, 2012, the 30^th Board of Directors Meeting of the Association of East Asian Research Universities (AEARU) was held in Nanjing University, China. The meeting consisting presidents and representatives from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Nanjing University, NTHU, Osaka University, Peking University, Seoul National University and Tohoku University. The Board reviewed past activities and discussed new programs proposed by member universities, as well as decided the date and venue of upcoming events.

AEARU's 1^st Distinguished Lecture Series was also held in Nanjing University in conjunction with the celebration of her 110^th anniversary. The lecture series featured three outstanding professors from Taiwan and China. It opened with President Lih J. Chen welcoming the audience for taking their precious Sunday to attend and support AEARU's event and thanking the speakers for sharing their award winning researches with the public. Prof. Ann-Shyn Chiang of NTHU started with his speech on "Systems Consolidation of Olfactory Long-Term Memory in the Drosophila Brain", which was an extension of his recent discoveries published as a full article in Science. The second presentation was Prof. Jong-Dao Jou from National Taiwan University, and he talked about his research on typhoon and climate change in Taiwan, which is always a big concern for people in Taiwan and East Asia. Lastly, Prof. Chenyu Zhang of Nanjing University made a remarkable presentation about MicroRNA. All These presentations were interesting and inspiring, and have attracted numerous rounds of applause from an attentive audience./p>

Under the invitation from one of the world-class sculpture artist, Prof. Wu Weishan, the Dean of Sculpture Center of Chinese National Academy of Arts, NTHU representatives visited Renjie Yuan Sculpture Garden in Wuxi, China, and the Sculpture Museum in Nanjing University; both places display Prof. Wu's most famous pieces, as well as attended the inauguration ceremony of the new Confucius statue installed in the Nanjing University campus. The Confucius statue was sculpted by Prof. Wu as a present for the Nanjing University's 110^th anniversary. During their visit, NTHU representatives had also attended NJU's 110^th anniversary ceremony.