UNC faculty member killed in shooting said he had a troubled student

 

WRAL News spoke to a man who says he was a mentor to the UNC faculty member shot to death on campus Tuesday. .

Professor Zijie Yan was identified as the faculty victim in a deadly Monday shooting that sent the UNC-Chapel Hill campus into lockdown. He was the academic adviser of suspect Tailei Qi, according to a university web page. Yan, who was identified as the victim Tuesday in Orange County court documents, was an associate professor in the department of applied physical sciences, where he focused on nanoscience technology. He joined the faculty at UNC in 2019 after stints as an assistant professor at Clarkson University and a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Chicago, according to a university bio. He earned his PhD in materials engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York.