Three years ago, assistant professor Jun Zhang was the toast of the New York University physics and math departments. A scientific paper he'd written explaining―among other things―why flags flap in a breeze was making the news, often illustrated with a waving American flag. "My face was on ABCNews With Peter Jennings," he recalls in amazement. They still love him at NYU, and he still talks daily with his grad students―but not face to face. Last summer, as is his habit, he visited his mother in China. Now he is stuck there. The U.S. State Department has been mulling his once easy visa renewal for more than a month. While an emergency replacement teaches his class, Zhang uses the phone and the Internet to stay in touch and pines for his girlfriend. Instead of a flat in Greenwich Village, home is a $40-a-day Beijing hotel room.
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