TIANJIN, Oct. 18 (Xinhua) -- With congratulatory messages displayed on giant outdoor screens in New York's Times Square and on landmark buildings in Shanghai, Guangzhou and many other Chinese cities, Nankai University celebrated its centennial anniversary this week.

Thousands of alumni from home and abroad gathered at the university in north China's Tianjin Municipality, touring around the campus, attending celebrative activities, and sharing their views on how the prestigious institution will retain its academic vitality in the next century.

Founded in 1919, Nankai University has long been one of the leading comprehensive universities in China with a wide range of disciplines, featuring a balance between the humanities and the sciences.

Cao Xuetao, president of the university, said that starting on a new centennial journey, the research-oriented university will devote itself to creating a pleasant academic environment, building a dynamic global faculty and cultivating talents with global vision.

On Thursday, the Nankai-Oxford Joint Research Institute was inaugurated as part of a new initiative launched in 2019, following the launch of the Nankai-Birmingham joint research institute in July.

The initiative will see Nankai join hands with a number of top universities and research institutes abroad to achieve breakthroughs in frontier research in fields such as biomedicine.

The university now has 26 academic colleges, more than 2,000 faculty members and over 26,500 full-time students, according to its official website.

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