On February 10, 1963, Yam Wing Wa was born in Hong Kong.

Her father is a civil engineer and her mother is a housewife.

According to Ren Yonghua’s account, neither of her parents guided her to pursue the path of science.

It was her curiosity about nature and her analytical nature that led her to science.

When she was in elementary school, she broke a thermometer and was amazed by how the mercury in the thermometer flowed and coalesced in her hand.

In middle school, she was greatly inspired by one of her middle school teachers.

Even though she was pregnant, the teacher still taught until the last moment.

Yam Wing-wa graduated from the Department of Chemistry of the University of Hong Kong in 1985 and received his PhD from the same school in 1988.

During her Ph.D., Ren Yonghua studied under Academician Zhi Zhiming, and she met her future husband in Zhi Zhiming’s research group.

During his PhD studies, Ren Yonghua was engaged in research on the oxidation chemistry of ruthenium metal.

After graduating with his PhD in 1988, Ren Yonghua obtained a junior teaching position in the newly established Department of Applied Science at City University of Hong Kong (then called City Polytechnic).

At that time, the scientific research facilities of the City Polytechnic were very poor. Ren Yonghua ordered the first batch of chemistry books for the university's library and the first batch of beakers and chemicals for the laboratory.

While at City Polytechnic, she was responsible for teaching undergraduates. Outside of teaching time, Ren Yonghua used the laboratory equipment of her doctoral supervisor, Professor Zhi Zhiming, to engage in scientific research.

During this period, she devoted herself to a new research direction - luminescence of metal complexes.

In 1990, Ren Yonghua transferred to his alma mater, the University of Hong Kong, to teach.

From the summer of 1991 to the summer of 1992, Ren Yonghua visited the research group of Nobel Prize winner Geoffrey Wilkinson at Imperial College London twice, where she began to turn to research on organometallic synthesis.

After returning to Hong Kong from London, Yam Yonghua began research on organometallic luminophores and prepared long-life cold-luminescent organometallics. The excited state lifetime is on the order of microseconds, which is longer than the excited state lifetime of green fluorescent protein and other fluorescent materials.

Promoted the development of organic light-emitting diodes (OLED).

In 1995, Ren Yonghua was promoted to senior lecturer, professor in 1997, chair professor in 1999, and department chair from 2000 to 2005.

In 2001, Ren Yonghua began to serve as the Huang Qianheng Huang Qianli Endowed Professor (Chemistry and Energy). In 2007, he won the Fulbright Distinguished Scholar Award.

In 2001, Ren Yonghua was elected as an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. At the age of 38, he was the youngest academician at the time.

Coincidentally, her doctoral supervisor Zhi Zhiming was also 38 years old when he was elected as an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1995, making him the youngest academician in China at the time.

In 2006, Ren Yonghua was elected as an academician of the Third World Academy of Sciences.

In 2012, he was elected as a foreign academician of the American Academy of Sciences.

In 2005, Ren Yonghua won the second prize of the National Natural Science Award of China for "Study on Molecular Design and Luminescent Properties of Transition Metal Alkynyl and Chalcogenium Cluster Complexes".

In 2011, she received the L’Oréal-UNESCO Prize for Women in Science “in recognition of her work on luminescent materials and innovative technologies for capturing solar energy.