YAO Xi was born in Wujin, Jiangsu Province in 1935. He graduated from the Electromechanical Department of Jiaotong University in 1957. He is president of the Research Institute of Functional Materials of Tongji University. He taught at Xian Jiaotong University from 1957 to 1979. He went to the United States for further study in the Research Institute of Materials of Pennsylvania State University. He started his Ph.D. degree program in 1980 and completed his four-year Ph.D. program within one year and eleven months. His doctoral dissertation was chosen to be the best doctoral dissertation of the Year on material science and won Xerox Prize. He became the first person who had obtained his Ph.D. degree within the shortest period of time since the university started the degree in solid-state science. He remained in the university and did his research as a post-doctoral student for one more year. He returned to the Electromechanical Department of Xian Jiaotong University in 1983 and became the first supervisor of doctoral students in electric materials and devices in our country. Professor Yao is one of the outstanding experts in electric ceramics in the world. He was elected to be a Member of the International Academy of Ceramics Science in 1989. He advocated establishing the Asian Association of Ferroelectrics and was elected the chairman of the association in 1993. He was awarded Ross Coffin Purdy Prize by the American Society of Ceramics in 1993. This is the highest prize that one can achieve for the remarkable contributions he has made to the development of ceramics.