Members

Principal Investigator

Dr Lingxuan Liu is a leading researcher in sustainability and environmental governance. A significant part of his research includes comparative governance studies among United States, UK, China and Japan. He has a track recording of academic collaboration with Chinese universities and research institutes, and currently co-hosts a five-year project of the transitioning environmental governance funded by NSFC, working with UNEP. He publishes on Global Environmental Change, Environment and Planning, Journal of Cleaner Production, Science of Total Environment, Business Strategy and Environment, etc. He is also an action researcher who has rich experience working with practitioners in both public and private sectors, such as local government, industrial parks, multi-national companies including Walmart, Apple, Pentland Brands etc., as well as environmental NGOs. His international experience and capability of working with and across multiple cultures will make him a strong candidate as project coordinator and PI.

Co-Investigators

  • Dr Timo von Wirth, DRIFT, vonwirth@drift.eur.nl

Timo von Wirth is Assistant Professor at the Erasmus School of Social and Behavioral Sciences and the Dutch Research Institute for Transitions. Originally trained in Economics and Geography at the University of Technology (RWTH) Aachen, Germany, he completed his PhD at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich focusing on well-being and innovation in transforming cities. Focus areas of his work: Innovation diffusion and co-creation in environmental governance; Local identity and the role of place in global, dynamic networks, and Well-being and quality of life in the digital age.

  • Professor Dr Shenghui CUI, IUE, shcui@iue.ac.cn

Professor Dr Shenghui Cui is the Associate Director of Urban Ecological and Environmental Planning and Management Centre. His main research interests include Climate change and urban planning, urban metabolism, and urban environmental management. He has been the lead researchers in four national-funded or international collaboration projects, such as urban vulnerability, coastal urban planning, and climate adaptation policies in East and Southeast Asia. He has published more than 70 papers, including Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS), Environment International, Environmental Science and Technology, Scientific reports, Science of the Total Environment and Environmental Research Letters, etc.

  • Mr Degang YANG, IEG, dgyang@ms.xjb.ac.cn

Mr Yang Degang is the lead researcher and Director of Department of Resource Management and Regional Development in Arid Areas in IEG. He also sits in the committee of Sustainable Agriculture and Urbanisation Research of Chinese Geographer Association. His research focuses on oasis agriculture and regional sustainable development, and has been awarded twice by Xinjiang Autonomous Region for research contributions in regional function zoning, rational development and utilisation of water resources, and regional development and simulation. He was also awarded the Second-Tier Prize of National Science and Technology Advancement.

Research staff

  • Dr Mustafa Ali, LU, m.ali18@lancaster.ac.uk

Mustafa Ali is a Research Associate at Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business, Lancaster University. His research is interdisciplinary investigating issues related to gender, health and the environment. During the last 4 years he has worked on 3 international projects across Europe and Asia and received funding from the prestigious NSFC, China in 2018. His research has been published in Journal of Cleaner Production, Resources Conservation & Recycling, Science of the Total Environment and Waste Management among others.

  • Ms Jing ZHANG, LU, j.zhang54@lancaster.ac.uk

Jing ZHANG is currently a second-year PhD candidate on Environmental Science at Lancaster University and working as the project coordinator of the Europe-China jointly funded project SIRIUS (Sustainable, Innovative, Resilient and Interconnected Urban food System). Prior to Lancaster, she has a BA in Public Administration from Nanjing University and a MA in Energy, Resources and Environment from the Johns Hopkins University-Nanjing University Center for Chinese and American Studies. Her current research focuses on the resilience of food systems through an actor-based perspective, primarily looking at the pork system in China as the case. Her research has been published on Sustainability.

  • Dr Aniek Hebinck, DRIFT, hebinck@drift.eur.nl

Aniek Hebinck is a postdoctoral researcher at DRIFT. She is particularly interested in the dynamics associated with bringing about food systems transformations. Key to her work is an interdisciplinary approach that includes the use of a food systems thinking, foresight and forward looking approaches, and the use of co-production processes. She previously was a PhD-candidate at the Stockholm Resilience Centre and as a researcher at the Environmental Change Institute of the University of Oxford, and was affiliated to the Rural Sociology Group of Wageningen University. In her SIRIUS research she continues the learnings from other international projects such as TRANSMANGO, SENTINEL and SUSFANS.

  • Dr Wei HUANG, IUE, whuang@iue.ac.cn

Wei Huang is an Assistant Professor in Key Lab of Urban Environment and Health, Institute of Urban Environment, CAS. His research mainly focuses on sustainable material and energy metabolism in urbanization process from the perspective of industrial ecology, providing science-based solutions for policy making. He currently hosts an NSFC-funded youth program, and has published on Journal of Cleaner Production, Journal of Environmental Management, Journal of Industrial Ecology, Resources, Conservation & Recycling etc.

  • Dr Bing GAO, IUE, binggao@iue.ac.cn

Associated professor Dr. Bing Gao is a staff of Institute of Urban Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences. His research interests mainly focus on studying urban metabolism and its environmental effects, carbon & nitrogen cycling and its environmental impacts. He has responsible for the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), the Special Foundation of China Postdoctoral Science, China Postdoctoral Science Foundation funded project, the Young Talents Projects of the Institute of Urban Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and attended several programs funded by NSFC, the National Basic Research Program of China (the 973 project). He published about 40 papers on Global Change Biology, Science of the Total Environment, Journal of Cleaner Production, Agriculture Ecosystems & Environment and Biogeosciences, etc.

  • Dr Su XU, IUE, sxu@iue.ac.cn

Su Xu is working as an assistant research fellow in the Institute of Urban Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He got his doctor degree from the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences and his major was environmental management and economy. He is now interested in city metabolism, industry ecology, sustainable development and so on. He is in charge of 1 project of National Natural Science Foundation of China, 1 project of Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province and 1 project of National key special fund.

  • Ms Lan WANG, IUE, lwang@iue.ac.cn

Wang Lan is a third year PhD candidate from Key Lab of Urban Environment & Health, Institute of Urban Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Her research interests include sustainable diet, obesity- environment-diet nexus, and sustainable food system. Participating in the National Natural Science Foundation “Sustainable, Innovative, Resilient, and Interconnected Urban food System”. Academic Activities: “Impacts of dietary patterns on obesity and the environment” 16th International Conference on Urban Health: People Oriented Urbanization; “Scenarios analysis of the environmental impacts of dietary pattern in China”. 2019 International Conference on Resource Sustainability. Adelaide. Australia; and “Balancing overweight/Obesity and Low-Carbon Diet in Urbanizing China”. The 2nd Society for Urban Ecology-China Chapter Seminar and 8th Parallel Session: Urban Ecological Environment and Human Health. Shanghai, China.

  • Ms Qiumeng ZHONG, IUE, qmzhong@iue.ac.cn

A master student from IUE (Institute of Urban and Environmental, Chinese Academy of Sciences), major in ecology, and focus on food system. In SIRIUS, I am responsible for the research on urban food system sustainability.

  • Ms Jingjing YIN, IEG, yinjingjing11@mails.ucas.edu.cn

Jingjing Yin is a PhD student currently studying at the IEG, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences. Her research interests include sustainable agriculture, climate change and diet, food culture. She is currently conducting research on diet shift and has published on the Science of the Total Environment