born Feb. 12, 1936, Beijing, China
Chinese astrophysicist and dissident held partially responsible for the 1989 student rebellion in Tiananmen Square .
In 1957 he was expelled from the Chinese Communist Party for a paper decrying the Marxist position on physics. He later taught at Beijing's University of Science and Technology (Keda); in 1966 he was sent to a communal farm to be reeducated. After the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, Fang's party membership was restored. Appointed a vice president of one branch of Keda in 1985, he began work on restructuring it and reforming educational policy. During the demonstrations in Tiananmen Square he took refuge in the U.S. embassy, and in 1990 he and his wife were allowed to leave China. He subsequently conducted research in Britain and the U.S.