He then conducted postdoctoral research at the university of north carolina at chapel hill ( 1987 - 1989 ) and cornell university ( 1989 - 1992 ) . professor xia joined the chinese university of hong kong in 1992 as lecturer in the physics department and was promoted to professor in 2002 一九八七至一九八九年，他在北卡大学教堂山分校从事博士后研究工作，随后，于一九八九至一九九二年在康乃尔大学继续博士后研究工作。
I arrived in chapel hill in august 2002 to study at the joint peace center at duke university and unc , the university of north carolina at chapel hill - and if you know a little bit about the two schools you would be surprised about the word " joint " in this sentence - cooperation between the universities has until then been mainly limited to grim smiles and a forced handshake at the beginning of each basketball game 我在二零零二年八月抵达教堂山公爵大学，在杜克大学和北卡罗来纳大学的共同和平中心研究如果你们对这两个学校有一点了解，你们会对?共同?这个字眼出现在这句话里感到惊讶大学之间的合作直到那时仍局限在每一场篮球比赛开场的勉强笑容与握手。
