Yuan-Cheng Fung

Yuan-Cheng "Bert" Fung (born 1919) is an American bioengineer and scientist. He is regarded as a founding figure of bioengineering, tissue engineering, and the "Founder of Modern Biomechanics".

Fung was born in Jiangsu Province, China in 1919. He earned a bachelor's degree in 1941 and a master's degree in 1943 from the National Central University (later renamed Nanjing University in mainland China and reinstated in Taiwan), and earned a Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology in 1948.

Fung currently is Professor Emeritus and Research Engineer at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD). He published prominent texts along with Pin Tong who was then at Hong Kong University of Science & Technology.

He is the author of numerous books including Foundations of Solid Mechanics, Continuum Mechanics, and a series of books on Biomechanics. He is also one of the principal founders of the Journal of Biomechanics and was a past chair of the ASME International Applied Mechanics Division. In 1972, Fung established the Biomechanics Symposium under the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. This biannual summer meeting, first held at the Georgia Institute of Technology, became the annual Summer Bioengineering Conference. Fung and colleagues were also the first to recognize the importance of residual stress on arterial mechanical behavior.

Fung's Law

Fung's famous exponential strain constitutive equation for preconditioned soft tissues is

${\displaystyle w={\frac {1}{2}}\left[q+c\left(e^{Q}-1\right)\right]}$

with

${\displaystyle q=a_{ijkl}E_{ij}E_{kl}\qquad Q=b_{ijkl}E_{ij}E_{kl}}$

quadratic forms of Green-Lagrange strains ${\displaystyle E_{ij}}$ and ${\displaystyle a_{ijkl}}$, ${\displaystyle b_{ijkl}}$ and ${\displaystyle c}$ material constants. ${\displaystyle w}$ is a strain energy function per volume unit, which is the mechanical strain energy for a given temperature. Materials that follow this law are known as Fung-elastic.

• Theodore von Karman Medal, 1976
• Otto Laporte Award, 1977
• Worcester Reed Warner Medal, 1984
• Jean-Leonard-Marie Poiseuille Award, 1986
• Timoshenko Medal, 1991
• Lissner Award for Bioengineering, from ASME
• Borelli Medal, from ASB
• Landis Award, from Microcirculation Society
• Alza Award, from BMES
• Melville Medal, 1994
• United States National Academy of Engineering Founders Award (NAE Founders Award), 1998
• National Medal of Science, 2000
• Fritz J. and Dolores H. Russ Prize, 2007 ("for the characterization and modeling of human tissue mechanics and function leading to prevention and mitigation of trauma.")
• Revelle Medal, from UC San Diego, 2016

Fung was elected to the United States National Academy of Science (1993), the National Academy of Engineering (1979), the Institute of Medicine (1991), the Academia Sinica (1968), and is a Foreign Member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (1994 election).