The Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, which awards annual grants to individuals in academics and the arts, announced its new fellows for 2016 on Wednesday, several of whom are of Chinese descent.

Grants were given to 178 scholars, artists, and scientists based on prior achievement and "exceptional promise", chosen from a pool of nearly 3,000 applicants.

Of those, Wu Tsang, Jing Tsu, Ge Wang and Mei-Po Kwan were awarded in the film-video, East Asian studies, music research, and geography and environmental studies categories, respectively.

"It's exciting to name 178 new Guggenheim Fellows. These artists and writers, scholars and scientists represent the best of the best," Edward Hirsch, president of the foundation, said in a statement.

"Each year since 1925, the Guggenheim Foundation has bet everything on the individual, and we're thrilled to continue to do so with this wonderfully talented and diverse group. It's an honor to be able to support these individuals to do the work they were meant to do," he said.

Kwan, a professor of geography at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, was granted a fellowship for her work on environmental health, sustainable cities, and urban/social issues in cities.

She told China Daily that she will be using the Guggenheim Fellowship to conduct research on the uncertain geographic context problem, a term first articulated by Kwan in 2012 that refers to the effects of area-based attributes in a city on individual behaviors or outcomes, such as physical activity.

"I am truly delighted and proud to be a foreign-born Chinese receiving this great honor," she said.

Tsu is a professor of East Asian languages and literature at Yale University and will be using her grant to finish writing a book on how Chinese script has been influencing the alphabetical world.

Her area of study focuses on "how China has negotiated its place in the world since the 16th century, especially in the last 150 years," she said.

"It's wonderful to receive this honor and important nod from the Guggenheim Foundation. It confirms the importance of teaching and learning about China and Asia in new ways in the changing world we live in," she said.

Wang is an assistant professor of music at Stanford University, where he researches programming languages and software design for creating music.

Tsang is a Los Angeles-based performer and filmmaker, whose projects have been featured at the Tate Modern in London and the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

The Guggenheim Fellowship is open to all US and Canadian permanent residents and only professionals who are mid-career.

amyhe@chinadailyusa.com