Qian Xuesen
Yao was born in Wuxi, Jiangsu Province. He graduated from the department of metallurgy of Shanghai Jiao Tong University in July 1945, and obtained a doctorate of engineering from University of Birmingham in UK in 1951. After returning to China in September 1957, Yao served in the Fifth Academy of the Ministry of National Defense, headed by Qian Xuesen. He helped found the Institute of Materials and Technology (later affiliated to the Seventh Ministry of Machine Building and became the director.