Appendix B

Biographies of Speakers and Moderators

KAREN SETO (NAS) (Planning Committee Chair) is the Frederick C. Hixon Professor of Geography and Urbanization Science at Yale University. An urban and land change scientist, she is one of the world’s leading experts on contemporary urbanization and global change. Her research focus is on how urbanization will affect the planet. She has pioneered methods to reconstruct urban land use with satellite imagery and has developed novel methods to forecast urban expansion. She has conducted urbanization research in China for 20 years and in India for more than 10. Her research has generated insights on the links between urbanization and land use, food systems, biodiversity, and climate change. Dr. Seto has served on numerous national and international scientific bodies. She is co-leading the urban mitigation chapter for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 6th Assessment Report and co-led the same chapter for the IPCC 5th Assessment Report. She is co-editor-in-chief of the journal Global Environmental Change. From 2000 to 2008, she was faculty at Stanford, where she held joint appointments in the Woods Institute for the Environment and the School of Earth Sciences. She has received numerous awards for her scientific contributions, including the Outstanding Contributions to Remote Sensing Research Award from the American Association of Geographers. Dr. Seto is an elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She earned a Ph.D. in geography from Boston University.

LUIS BETTENCOURT is the inaugural director of the Mansueto Institute for Urban Innovation and professor of ecology and evolution at the University of Chicago, as well as an external professor of complex systems at the Santa Fe Institute. He has held postdoctoral positions at the University of Heidelberg (Germany), Los Alamos National Laboratory (Director’s Fellow and Slansky Fellow), and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Center for Theoretical Physics). He has worked extensively on complex systems theory and on cities and urbanization, in particular. His research emphasizes the creation of new interdisciplinary synthesis to describe cities in quantitative and predictive ways, informed by classical theory from various disciplines and the growing availability of empirical data worldwide. He is the author of over 100 scientific papers and several edited books. His research has been featured in leading media venues, including the New York Times, Nature, Wired, New Scientist, and Smithsonian. He was trained as a theoretical physicist and obtained his undergraduate degree from Instituto Superior Técnico (Lisbon, Portugal) and his Ph.D. from Imperial College (University of London, UK) for research in statistical and high-energy physics models of the early Universe.

LINDA BLEVINS joined the National Science Foundation (NSF) as the deputy assistant director of the Engineering Directorate in December 2017. For more than a decade prior to joining NSF, she was a senior technical advisor in the Office of the Deputy Director for Science Programs in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science, where she provided technical and policy advice on all aspects of science funding program management. She previously served as an NSF program director, as a senior member of the technical staff at Sandia National Laboratories, and as a National Institute of Standards and Technology research staff member. Her research expertise is in combustion. Dr. Blevins received a Ph.D. from Purdue University, an M.S. from Virginia Tech, and a B.S. from the University of Alabama, all in mechanical engineering.

JIANMING CAI is a full professor at the Institute of Geographical Sciences and Natural Resources Research (IGSNRR) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), and the director of RUAF (Resource Centres on Urban Agriculture and Food Security) China, affiliated to the RUAF Foundation based in the Netherlands. He has published more than 160 papers in academic journals both in Chinese and English, plus more than 100 key consultant reports. Dr. Cai frequently serves as a senior consultant or expert

on sustainable urbanization, regional and urban development, regional cooperation and integration, culture-embedded place-making, urban agriculture and food security to international agencies, such as the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-HABITAT), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), World Bank, European Union, Asian Development Bank, Ford Foundation, International Development Research Centre (IDRC), German Technical Cooperation Agency (GTZ), Directorate-General for International Cooperation (DGIS), and the Lincoln Institute. He has also advised various Chinese government agencies, from the central to local levels, as well as private-sector companies such as Shui On Land. He is an active member of many academic associations including the vice-chairman of the Chinese Urban Agriculture and Recreational Agriculture Association as well as a board member of the Association of Administration Regionalization, Chinese Geographic Society Rural Development Division, and Urban and Regional Planning Association. His current research focuses on urban-rural sustainable development with emphases on urban and peri-urban agrotourism, urban-rural linkages, spatial restructuring from cultural perspectives, urban renewal, and innovative space making. Dr. Cai received his first degree in urban planning and economic geography from Beijing University, his master’s in geographical information systems for urban applications from ITC of the Netherlands, and his Ph.D. in sustainable urban development from the University of Hong Kong.

FRANKLIN CARRERO-MARTÍNEZ joined the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in 2018, where he directs the Global Policy and Development and the Science and Technology for Sustainability program within the Division of Policy and Global Affairs. Prior to this appointment, he was the acting deputy science and technology adviser to the U.S. secretary of state. His multidisciplinary career includes several roles in academia and government: from researcher and educator, science administrator, to science policy and diplomacy. Previously, Dr. Carrero-Martínez held appointments as an associate professor at the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez, adjunct professor at the UPR Medical Science Campus, and visiting scholar at Duke University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Japan’s Institute of Genetics. Dr. Carrero-Martínez started his career in science diplomacy and policy as the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s Roger Revelle Fellow in Global Stewardship. He served

this prestigious fellowship with a joint appointment between the Office of the Science and Technology Adviser to the Secretary of State (STAS) and the National Academy of Sciences. At the end of his fellowship, he served as program director at the National Science Foundation supporting the foundation’s diplomatic and representational obligations, while managing a portfolio of international basic science collaboration grants before returning to STAS in 2016. As the Department’s senior advisor on science, technology, and innovation issues (STI), he directed the STAS Office. In this role he provided senior officials with analysis, guidance, recommendations, and strategic planning to anticipate the foreign policy impacts of emerging STI issues, built STI capacity within the Department, and engaged the National Security Innovation Base to promote Department priorities. Dr. Carrero-Martínez holds a B.S. in biology with honors from the University of Puerto Rico, a Ph.D. in cell and developmental neurobiology, and a certificate in business administration from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

ROBERT CERVERO (Planning Committee Member) is professor emeritus of city and regional planning at the University of California, Berkeley, where he chaired the department and directed the Institute of Urban and Regional Development and the University of California Transportation Center. His research focuses on sustainable transportation policy and the nexus between urban transportation and land-use systems. He has written numerous books and articles in these areas, including Beyond Mobility, which won the 2019 National Urban Design Best Book Award. Currently, he is working with AECOM on a study of transit joint development for the U.S. Transit Cooperative Research Program, is a faculty affiliate at NYU-Abu Dhabi and Tongji University in Shanghai, and serves on the international advisory panel for Dubai’s 2040 strategic master plan. He was a contributing author to the IPCC Fifth Assessment and UN-HABITAT’s Global Report on Sustainable Mobility. He recently received the Athena Accolade from KTH University, the Distinguished Legacy Award from ITS at the University of California, Berkeley, and was recognized by Planning magazine as one of the top planning academics in the United States based on Google Scholar h-index citations, naming him “the world’s top expert on transit-oriented development.” Dr. Cervero received his Ph.D. in urban planning from the University of California, Los Angeles.

WEI-QIANG CHEN is a professor of resources and urban sustainability science at the Institute of Urban Environment, CAS. He received his

undergraduate and Ph.D. degrees from the School of Environment at Tsinghua University, Beijing, and was at Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies from 2010 to 2015. His research focuses on (1) urban metabolism and urban complexity, and (2) anthropogenic cycles and trade of resources, especially metals and plastics. Dr. Chen’s studies have been published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Environmental Science and Technology, and other first-level journals. He was elected to the board of the International Society for Industrial Ecology in 2018, and was the founding president of the Chinese Society for Industrial Ecology created in 2015. He is now associate editor for the journals Resources, Conservation, and Recycling and Journal of Industrial Ecology.

FRANCES COLÓN (Planning Committee Member) is chief executive officer of Jasperi Consulting and a 2019 recipient of the Leadership in Government Fellowship of Open Society Foundations, an initiative supporting seasoned public servants chosen from the senior ranks of federal, state, and local government who have advanced economic and social change. Dr. Colón is the former deputy science and technology adviser to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of State (2012–2017) where she promoted the integration of science and technology into foreign policy priorities. In her role as science diplomat, Dr. Colón led reengagement of scientific collaboration with Cuba and coordinated climate change policy for the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas announced by President Obama. Dr. Colón is founding board member of Cenadores Puerto Rico, a nonprofit that provides a platform for the Puerto Rican diaspora and friends of Puerto Rico to strengthen civil society on the island. Dr. Colón is a graduate of the National Hispana Leadership Institute, and fellow of the U.S.-Japan Leadership Program, the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, and the Austria Leaders Program. In 2016, Dr. Colón was named one of the 20 most influential Latinos in technology by CNET. She is the recipient of the Hispanic Heritage Foundation’s 2015 Inspira Award and a 2015–2016 Google Science Fair judge. Dr. Colón earned her Ph.D. in neuroscience in 2004 from Brandeis University and her B.S. in biology in 1997 from the University of Puerto Rico.

CHENGRI DING is professor in the School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at the University of Maryland. Dr. Ding specializes in urban economics, urban and land policies, urban planning and policy,

and China studies. He has published articles in leading journals such as Journal of Urban Economics, Journal of Regional Science, Urban Studies, Environment and Planning B, Housing Policy Debates, and Land Use Policy. Dr. Ding has written three books, five manuscripts in Chinese, and numerous publications in China Journal. He has been a principal investigator (PI) for many international policy projects on China, ranging from urban master planning, farmland protection, property tax reform, and local public financing. Dr. Ding has given over 50 invited or keynote speeches/presentations. He has been a consultant to the World Bank, Global Business Network, FAO, and leading Chinese agencies such as the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC). He serves on the Advisory Board for the International Institute of Property Taxation. Dr. Ding is the founding director for the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy’s China Program.

YINGLING FAN is a professor in the regional planning and policy area at the University of Minnesota and works interdisciplinarily in the fields of land use, transportation, social equity, and public health. Her overarching research goal is to investigate the impacts of spatial planning (e.g., land use, growth management, and transit improvements) on human activities and movements, as well as to understand the health and social aspects of such impacts. Her research combines ecological and behavioral analyses, most quantitatively, as a means of addressing urban sustainability challenges. Dr. Fan has published her work in various urban planning and transportation research journals. Her recent projects include investigating the impact of urban form on health disparities, the role of neighborhood and family structure in influencing leisure-time activity patterns, and the impact of transit corridor improvements on job accessibility and neighborhood change. She held the title of McKnight Land-Grant Professor from 2012 to 2014—a special award that recognizes and honors the University of Minnesota’s most promising junior faculty. Dr. Fan has received the Collaborator of the Year Award from the Hennepin County-University Partnership, the Scholar Award from the Children, Youth and Family Consortium at the University of Minnesota, the Best Paper Award from the Transportation Research Board (TRB) Pedestrian Committee, and the TRB Patricia F. Waller Award. She holds a Ph.D. in city and regional planning from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a bachelor’s degree in transportation engineering from Southeast University, Nanjing, China.

MATEI GEORGESCU is associate professor and associate director of the School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Arizona State University (ASU). He is also senior sustainability scientist and a member of the affiliated faculty for the Center for Biodiversity Outcomes at ASU’s Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability. Dr. Georgescu’s research aims to improve understanding and characterization of distinct phenomena related to urbanization-induced landscape change. He focuses on identifying hydro-climatic and air quality impacts resulting from large-scale urbanization, as well as potential adaptation and mitigation strategies. In addition, Dr. Georgescu addresses environmental consequences (e.g., on climate and hydrology) of renewable energy expansion by integrating across physical, agricultural, and socioeconomic elements. The range of tools used to investigate these topics include climate models, remote sensing data and associated applications, and in situ weather/climate observations. Prior to joining ASU, Dr. Georgescu was a postdoctoral scholar in the Center on Food Security and the Environment (Department of Environmental Earth System Science) at Stanford University from 2008–2010. He received his Ph.D. in atmospheric science, M.S. in environmental sciences, and B.S. in meteorology from Rutgers University.

SUSAN HANSON (NAS) (Planning Committee Member) is a Distinguished University Professor Emerita and longtime professor of geography at Clark University. She is an urban geographer with interests in gender and economy, transportation, local labor markets, and sustainability. Her research has examined the relationship between the urban built environment and people’s everyday mobility within cities; within this context, questions of access to opportunity, and how gender affects access, have been paramount. Her books include Ten Geographic Ideas that Changed the World; Gender, Work, and Space (with Geraldine Pratt); and The Geography of Urban Transportation. Dr. Hanson has been the editor of several academic journals, including The Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Urban Geography, and Economic Geography and has been the geography editor of the International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, first and second editions. She has led the School of Geography at Clark and is a past president of the Association of American Geographers (AAG), a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a former Guggenheim Fellow, a former fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Social and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford, and a recipient of the Honors Award and of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the AAG

and of the Van Cleef Medal from the American Geographic Society. In 2000 she was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She was recently division chair of the TRB of the National Research Council (NRC) and is on the TRB Executive Committee, is on the advisory board of the NRC’s Gulf Research Program, and is on the editorial board of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Her B.A. is from Middlebury College, and, before earning her M.S. and Ph.D. at Northwestern University, she was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Kenya.

CHUNLIN HUANG is a researcher with the Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources (NIEER) at CAS. From 2009 to 2010, he was a postdoctoral researcher with the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of California, Los Angeles. He has published more than 50 papers in the Science Citation Index (SCI). Dr. Huang’s current research activities concern hydrological remote sensing, hydrological data assimilation, and big earth data for monitoring Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicators. He received his Ph.D. in cartography and geographic information systems from the Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute (CAREERI), CAS.

MARCIA McNUTT (NAS) is a geophysicist and the 22nd president of the National Academy of Sciences. From 2013 to 2016, she was editor-in-chief of Science journals. Dr. McNutt was director of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) from 2009 to 2013, during which time USGS responded to a number of major disasters, including the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. For her work to help contain that spill, Dr. McNutt was awarded the U.S. Coast Guard’s Meritorious Service Medal. She is a fellow of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), Geological Society of America, American Association for the Advancement of Science, and International Association of Geodesy. Dr. McNutt is a member of the American Philosophical Society and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a Foreign Member of the Royal Society, UK, and the Russian Academy of Sciences. In 1998, Dr. McNutt was awarded the AGU’s Macelwane Medal for research accomplishments by a young scientist, and she received the Maurice Ewing Medal in 2007 for her contributions to deep-sea exploration. Dr. McNutt received a B.A. in physics from Colorado College and Ph.D. in earth sciences from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.

DEB NIEMEIER (NAE) is the Clark Distinguished Chair of the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Maryland. Her primary research focus has been on developing highly accurate and accessible processes for emissions modeling and travel behavior models that can be used in the public sector, particularly the identification and modeling of environmental health disparities and those leading to improved understanding of formal and informal governance processes in urban and transportation planning. She is interested in emergent properties or characteristics that give rise to inequitable outcomes, particularly those associated with climate change. Prior to her appointment at the University of Maryland, she was a professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and professor in the School of Education and Biological and Agricultural Engineering at the University of California, Davis. Dr. Niemeier became a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 2014 and currently serves as past-chair of its Engineering Section. She was named a Guggenheim Fellow in 2015. In 2017, she was elected to the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and recently completed service as a member of its Board on Energy and Environmental Systems. She served as editor-in-chief for Transportation Research, Part A, the leading international journal focused on transportation policy and practice, and was the first woman in the journal’s history to hold this position. She received her Ph.D. in civil and environmental engineering from the University of Washington.

JIAHUA PAN (Planning Committee Member) is the director of the Institute for Urban and Environmental Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). He is also a professor of economics at CASS Graduate School. Areas of interest include the economics of sustainable development, energy and climate policy, urban transformation, world economy, and environmental and natural resource economics. Dr. Pan worked for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Beijing Office as an advisor on environment and development. He was also a lead author of the IPCC Working Group III 3rd, 4th, and 5th Assessment Report on Mitigation. He has been a member of the China National Expert Panel on Climate Change, a member of the National Foreign Policy Advisory Group and an advisor to the Ministry of Environment Protection. He was vice president of the Chinese Association of Urban Economy, Chinese Society of Ecological Economists, and Chinese Energy Association. Dr. Pan has been editor-in-chief of the Chinese Journal of Urban & Environmental

Studies and co-editor of Climate Change 2001: Mitigation. He has authored over 300 papers, articles and books in English (including in Science, Nature, and Oxford Review of Economic Policy) and Chinese (including in Journal of Economic Research and China Social Sciences). He has been awarded first and second prize of best research works, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (2003, 2005, 2013), and was winner of Sun Yefang Economic Sciences Prize, 2011, and China Green Person of the Year 2010/2011. Dr. Pan received his Ph.D. at Cambridge University in 1992.

MIGUEL ROMÁN is the founding director of the Earth from Space Institute (EfSI), an independent program of Universities Space Research Association (USRA) dedicated to supporting the development of long-term strategies for reducing disaster risk and promoting community resilience, using the unique vantage point of Space. Dr. Román currently serves as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA’s) Terra, Aqua, and Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership’s land discipline leader, helping manage a worldwide team of investigators in charge of generating long-term data records from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer and the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite, two of the largest and most comprehensive instrument suites ever launched to systematically monitor the planet’s vital signs. Before joining USRA, Dr. Román served for 10 years as a civil servant scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, where he pioneered the iconic Black Marble—a suite of satellite products that provide daily global views of Earth at night, with an emphasis on tracking the signatures of recovery across vulnerable communities affected by major disasters. Dr. Román has also led international activities under the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites and the Group on Earth Observations. President Barack Obama named him a recipient of the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, the highest honor bestowed by the U.S. government on researchers beginning their independent careers. His writings have been featured in numerous news outlets, including NPR, Washington Post, NBC, The Economist, Telemundo, Smithsonian Magazine, and BBC World News.

YAN SONG is director of the Program on Chinese Cities and a professor in the Department of City and Regional Planning at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Song’s research interests include low carbon and green cities, plan evaluation, land use development and regulations, spatial analysis of urban spatial structure and urban form, land

use and transportation integration, and how to accommodate research in the above fields by using geographic information systems (GIS) and other computer-aided planning tools. Dr. Song’s current research projects address domestic and international issues in the areas of impetus of urbanization and urban growth, tools of low carbon and green city developments, the efficacy of land and housing markets, effects of urban growth management regulations, and integration of urban land use and transportation plans. Her current research projects also document the evolution of China’s urban land and housing policies and urban spatial structure in the era of China’s transition toward a market economy. Dr. Song’s research projects have been supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, and Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. Dr. Song has served as a research affiliate at the National Center for Smart Growth at the University of Maryland and a faculty fellow at the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy. She has also served as a consultant on urban planning for the city government of Shenzhen, and a consultant on land use and transportation integration for the Beijing Municipal Institute of City Planning and Design in China.

ZHONGCHANG SUN is currently an associate researcher with the Institute of Remote Sensing and Digital Earth, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Dr. Sun received his Ph.D. in cartography and geographic information systems from the Centre for Earth Observation and Digital Earth, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China, in 2011. He has authored or coauthored more than 20 SCI papers. His current research interests include urban environment remote sensing, urban sustainability, and land surface dynamics remote sensing.

V. KELLY TURNER is assistant professor of urban planning at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her research addresses the relationship between institutions, urban design, and the environment through two interrelated questions: How does urban design relate to ecosystem services in cities, and to what extent do social institutions have the capacity to deliver those services. Her approach draws from social-ecological systems frameworks to address urban planning and design problem domains. In recent work she has used this approach to investigate microclimate regulation through New Urbanist design, water, and biodiversity management through homeowners associations, and stormwater management through green infrastructure interventions. Dr. Turner’s training is highly interdisciplinary.

Her work is funded by the National Science Foundation and the interdisciplinary National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center. She recently chaired the Human Dimensions of Global Change specialty group of the American Association of Geographers. Dr. Turner deploys interdisciplinary pedagogy in the classroom and teaches courses in environmentalism, urban sustainability, and urban ecology. She received a Ph.D. in geography from the School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning at Arizona State University, where she was an IGERT Fellow in urban ecology.

KONGJIAN YU has been a professor of urban and regional planning and landscape architecture since 1997, and was the founding dean of the College of Architecture and Landscape at Peking University. He is the founder and design principal of Turenscape. His pioneering research on ecological security patterns and sponge city has been adopted by the Chinese government as guiding theory for a nationwide ecological urbanism campaign, and has had significant impact on national environmental policies in China. Dr. Yu has published over 20 books and 300 articles. His work has been featured in publications such as Scientific American (December 2018), Landscape Architecture Magazine (February 2012), and two recently published books: Letters to Chinese Leaders: Kongjian Yu and the Future of the Chinese City and Designed Ecologies: The Landscape Architecture of Kongjian Yu. His ecological approach to urbanism has been implemented in over 200 cities in China and abroad. His projects won numerous international awards including 12 ASLA Excellence and Honor Awards, 5 WAF World Best Landscape of the Year Awards, and a ULI global award of excellence. He is founder and chief editor of the internationally awarded magazine Landscape Architecture Frontier. He has lectured worldwide, including over 60 keynote speeches at international conferences, and taught for 5 years at the Harvard Graduate School of Design as a visiting professor. He was elected International Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects, and received the Doctor Honoris Causa in Landscape and Environment from the Sapienza University of Rome and Honorary Doctor in Landscape Architecture from Norwegian University of Life Sciences. He received a Doctor of Design degree at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

YAPING ZHANG is the vice president of CAS. Earlier in his career, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Zoological Society of San Diego, Center for Reproduction of Endangered Species, until he went back to China

and worked as the director of the Laboratory of Cellular and Molecular Evolution and a professor at the Kunming Institute of Zoology (KIZ). In 2002, Dr. Zhang was appointed professor and head of the Laboratory of Genetics at Yunnan University. He was nominated vice-president of CAS in 2012. As a research professor at KIZ, he has been focusing his research on molecular evolution and genome biodiversity. His investigations involve five correlated areas: molecular phylogenetics; molecular ecology and conservation genetics; human genetics and evolution; origin of domestic animals and artificial selection; and genome diversity and evolution. Dr. Zhang has published more than 300 publications in SCI journals and is the author and co-author of five books. He was elected a member of the American Society of Human Genetics in 1996, Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution in 1997, and American Genetic Association in 1998. He was also elected vice president of the Chinese Society of Genetics in 2004, vice president of the Chinese Society of Zoology in 2005, and president of the Yunnan Association for Science and Technology in 2008. Dr. Zhang sits on editorial boards for several international periodicals, including Genome Biology and Evolution and Animal Genetics. Dr. Zhang has won dozens of natural science prizes in China, including the Ho Leung Ho Lee Prize for Science and Technology by the Ho Leung Ho Lee Foundation in 2004. He was elected a CAS member in 2003 and fellow of the Third World Academy of Sciences in 2007. Dr. Zhang received his bachelor’s degree from the Fudan University and his Ph.D. from the Kunming Zoology Institute of CAS.

WEIQI ZHOU is a professor of urban ecology at the Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences. He is the deputy director of the State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology and the director of the Beijing Urban Ecosystem Research Station, a long-term ecological research station focusing on the Beijing urban ecosystem. He is also the vice president of the Society for Urban Ecology (SURE), China Chapter. Before he joined the Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Davis. Dr. Zhou is broadly interested in urban and landscape ecology with respect to spatial heterogeneity of the landscape. He integrates field observations, remote sensing, and modeling to understand the structure of urban socio-ecological systems, and its link to ecological function. He works across many disciplines including landscape ecology, urban ecology, remote sensing, and GIS, and interacts with collaborators from different fields through his involvement with various collaborative projects. The interdisciplinarity

of his work has allowed him to develop innovative approaches and tools to better understanding the structure of urban socio-ecological systems, and its link to ecological function. He serves as an editorial board member for the journals Landscape Ecology, Landscape and Urban Planning, Journal of Urban Ecology, Remote Sensing, and Ecosystem Health and Sustainability. Dr. Zhou received his Ph.D. from the University of Vermont.

YONG-GUAN ZHU (Planning Committee Member), professor of biogeochemistry and environmental biology, is the director-general of the Institute of Urban Environment, CAS. He has been working on the biogeochemistry of nutrients, metals, and emerging pollutants (such as antibiotics and antibiotic resistance genes). Dr. Zhu is a leader in taking multiscale and multidisciplinary approaches to soil and environmental problems. Before returning to China in 2002, he worked as a research fellow (supported by the Royal Society London), the Queen’s University of Belfast, UK (1994–1995) and a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Adelaide (1998–2002), Australia. Dr. Zhu is currently the co-editor-in-chief of Environment International (Elsevier), and editorial member for several other international journals. He is a scientific committee member for the ICSU program on Human Health and Wellbeing in Changing Urban Environment, and served for 9 years as a member of the Standing Advisory Group for Nuclear Application, International Atomic Energy Agency (2004–2012). Dr. Zhu is the recipient of many international and Chinese merit awards, including the TWAS Science Award (2013) and National Natural Science Award (2009). Dr. Zhu has published over 300 papers in international journals, and these publications have attracted over 20,000 citations (Web of Science) with an H-index of 79. He was selected as a Web of Science Highly Cited Researcher (2016, 2017, and 2018) and is an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He obtained his B.S.c. from Zhejiang Agricultural University in 1989, M.S.c. from CAS in 1992, and Ph.D. in environmental biology from Imperial College, London, in 1998.