Professor Ming Xu is an internationally renowned expert in climate change, a leading ecologist, and a pioneering scholar in the field of the global carbon cycle. He currently serves as Director of the BNU-HKUST Laboratory of Green Innovation at Beijing Normal University. As a strategic scientist with profound international influence in global environmental governance, macroecological modeling, and science and technology policy, Professor Xu’s academic career spans leading research institutions in both China and the United States. He previously served for many years as a tenured professor at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, and was later invited to return to China as a Research Professor at the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He was also selected for the prestigious “Hundred Talents Program” of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the “Introduction of Outstanding Overseas Talents” program. Professor Xu has played a key role in the global scientific governance system, having served as Director of the Beijing Office of the Global Carbon Project (GCP) and as a member of the REgional Carbon Cycle Assessment and Processes (RECCAP) initiative. He has also long been invited to serve as an expert reviewer for reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), as well as for major research agencies in China and the United States, including the U.S. National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA, the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.
As an interdisciplinary frontier leader integrating Earth system science, ecohydrological processes, and biodiversity conservation, Professor Xu’s research focuses on the evolution of global climate change, ecosystem carbon cycling, precision modeling of ecohydrological processes, and global biodiversity conservation. With a broad international scientific vision, he has developed high-resolution Earth system models and advanced ecological network observation matrices to systematically elucidate global carbon–water coupling mechanisms and the responses of terrestrial ecosystems to extreme climate events. His research has not only established important scientific foundations in theoretical ecology, but has also played an irreplaceable role in applied practice and national strategic decision-making. Several high-quality policy advisory reports based on his rigorous scientific evidence received written instructions from national leadership, including Premier Wen Jiabao, successfully translating frontier ecological science into high-level decision-making evidence for China’s ecological civilization construction and global climate negotiations.
With decades of dedication to global ecology and carbon neutrality strategy, Professor Xu has achieved distinguished accomplishments in landmark academic output, global peer influence, and major scientific awards. Over the years, he has published more than 200 high-level papers in leading domestic and international journals, including Science and Nature portfolio journals, among which more than 150 have been indexed by SCI. He has also co-authored five landmark academic monographs. His research has generated sustained and substantial interdisciplinary influence in the international scientific community, with cumulative citations exceeding 10,000 on Google Scholar and nearly 6,000 citations in SCI-indexed literature. Professor Xu has led or participated in more than 30 major domestic and international research projects, and has been invited to deliver more than 20 keynote or invited presentations at leading international academic conferences. In recognition of his landmark contributions to ecological science and resources and environmental research, he has received numerous major honors, including the First Prize of the Sichuan Provincial Science and Technology Progress Award as a co-principal investigator, the First Prize of the National Excellent Engineering Consulting Achievement Award, the Second Prize of the Qinghai Provincial Science and Technology Progress Award, and the Second Prize of the Liang Xi Forestry Science and Technology Award. He also serves as an editorial board member of the internationally recognized Journal of Plant Ecology and the leading Chinese academic journal Acta Geographica Sinica, continuously guiding innovation in global ecological and environmental science.