Awards & Honors

Nineteen CEADs scholars, representing 24 person-times, were named in the 2024 global Highly Cited Researchers list.

- CEADs -

Led by Professor Dabo Guan of Tsinghua University, the CEADs team brings together young scholars from more than ten research institutions in China and other countries. The team studies the causes, impacts, and responses to climate change, analyzes the drivers of greenhouse gas emissions, and explores sustainable development pathways at global and national scales.

The team has long encouraged interdisciplinary collaboration. Scholars are supported in choosing research directions in the dual-carbon field, conducting innovative research, and accelerating the growth of young scientific and technological talent. This work aims to cultivate outstanding academic leaders with a global perspective and a focus on the frontiers of science and technology, while contributing talent and expertise to national dual-carbon goals.

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2024 Global Highly Cited Researchers

Clarivate recently released the 2024 global Highly Cited Researchers list, recognizing leading scientists from universities, research institutions, and commercial organizations whose work has had significant and broad influence in their fields. A total of 6,886 scientists from 69 countries and regions were named in the 2024 list. Across 21 research fields and cross-field categories, Highly Cited Researchers account for only about 0.1% of natural and social scientists worldwide. The selection methodology is developed by bibliometric experts and data scientists at the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI), using citation data and analysis. Papers by Highly Cited Researchers rank in the top 1% by citations for their field and year of publication, demonstrating important academic influence.

This year, six core CEADs members and thirteen advisory committee members were included in the list, with 24 person-times in total. The recognition affirms their world-class influence in their research areas and their outstanding contributions to the development of those fields. Professor Dabo Guan of Tsinghua University, Professor Qiang Zhang of Tsinghua University, Professor Pete Smith of the University of Aberdeen, Professor Philippe Ciais of the Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l Environnement in France, and Professor Steven Davis of Stanford University were each listed in two fields. Associate Professor Yuli Shan was also named as one of seven Highly Cited Researchers worldwide recognized for major societal impact.

CEADs has long conducted frontier interdisciplinary research in environmental science, ecology, and related fields, contributing young talent to national carbon neutrality and carbon peaking goals. In recent years, CEADs members have stood out in major domestic and international award selections and have contributed to stronger international cooperation on climate change.

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CEADs Honorees

Dabo Guan is Chair Professor of Fundamental Sciences at Tsinghua University, Deputy Director of the Tsinghua Institute for Carbon Neutrality, Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in the United Kingdom, Fellow of the American Geophysical Union, founder of the CEADs database, and lead expert of the Ministry of Science and Technology China-EU flagship international cooperation program on climate change and biodiversity during the 14th Five-Year Plan period. He has received honors including the Global Top 100 Most Influential Paper Award, the Cozzarelli Prize, the Philip Leverhulme Prize, and the Leontief Memorial Prize. His research focuses on the causes and impacts of climate change and on quantifying global and national dual-carbon pathways. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in both Environment and Ecology and Geosciences.

Kuishuang Feng is a tenured Associate Professor at the University of Maryland. His research focuses on socioeconomic and environmental accounting at regional, national, and global scales. He has published more than 100 papers in high-impact journals including PNAS and Nature portfolio journals. He serves as Associate Editor of Science of the Total Environment and Energy, Ecology and Environment. He is Deputy Secretary-General of the International Society for Industrial Ecology (ISIE), Co-Chair of the ISIE EEIO Section, and a Council Member of the International Input-Output Association. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Professor Zhu Liu is Director of the Institute of Climate and Carbon Neutrality at the University of Hong Kong, Professor at Tsinghua University, and Research Fellow at Harvard University. His research focuses on climate change mitigation and interdisciplinary carbon neutrality science. As a co-founder of Carbon Monitor and CEADs, he helped build a global daily carbon emissions database and led the Chinese Ecological Experimental System in Space, CHEESE, based on the Tiangong space station. He has published more than 100 academic papers and received honors including the Qiu Shi Outstanding Young Scholar Award, the Highly Cited Researcher Award, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research Green Talents Award, and the Special Award of the President of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Geosciences.

Jing Meng is a tenured Professor at University College London and a Research Fellow at the Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy and Natural Resource Governance. She received her PhD in Environmental Geography from Peking University in 2016. Her long-term work focuses on interdisciplinary research, including climate change mitigation policy, integrated assessment models driven by low-carbon technology innovation, and socioeconomic impacts of coordinated mitigation. Over the past five years, she has published more than 50 papers as first author or corresponding author, including co-corresponding author, in leading journals such as PNAS and Nature portfolio journals. She received the 2023 American Geophysical Union Global Environmental Change Early Career Award, was named to the 2022 MIT Technology Review Innovators Under 35 Asia Pacific list, received the 2020 Sustainable Development Future Leader Award, the 2018 Nature Communications Top 50 Earth and Planetary Sciences Paper Award, and the 2017 Environmental Research Letters Best Early Career Paper Award. She serves as Executive Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Cleaner Production and Associate Editor of Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres. In 2024, she was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Zhifu Mi is Deputy Dean of the Bartlett School of Sustainable Construction at University College London and a tenured Professor of Climate Change Economics. He has made contributions in integrated assessment modeling of climate change, carbon emissions accounting, and input-output analysis. He has been named to Forbes Europe 30 Under 30 and the Clarivate Highly Cited Researchers list, and has received awards including the UCL Outstanding Research Supervisor Award, given to one recipient across the university each year. He is Co-Editor-in-Chief of the SSCI journal Structural Change and Economic Dynamics. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Yuli Shan is an Associate Professor at the University of Birmingham and Head of Sustainability at the School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences. He is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and a contributing author to the IPCC Sixth Assessment Report. He has been included in the global Highly Cited Researchers list for five consecutive years and in the Stanford University global top 2% scientists list. He has received honors including the University of Birmingham Founders Award, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research Green Talents Award, and the China Top 100 Most Internationally Influential Academic Papers Award. His long-term research focuses on carbon emissions accounting, regional sustainable development, and climate change economics. He has published more than 100 papers in high-impact journals including CNS portfolio journals and serves as an editor for Scientific Data and Advances in Applied Energy. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

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Advisory Committee Honorees

Kebin He is a member of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and Dean of the Tsinghua Institute for Carbon Neutrality. His long-term research focuses on complex air pollution, especially PM2.5, including identification of atmospheric particulate matter and compound pollution, characteristics of complex source emissions and coordinated control of multiple pollutants, and coordinated control of air pollution and greenhouse gases. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Geosciences.

Shu Tao is a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Professor at the College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University. His research includes global pollutant emission inventories, pollutant transport and exposure modeling, and generation of rural residential-source pollutants and their impacts on indoor and outdoor air quality and health. He also serves as Associate Editor of Environmental Science & Technology, Editorial Board Member of Environmental Pollution, and a member of the Pacific Basin Consortium for Environment & Health Science. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Qiang Zhang is Deputy Head and Professor in the Department of Earth System Science at Tsinghua University. His work focuses on multiscale dynamic emission inventory development, air quality numerical simulation, satellite remote sensing of atmospheric composition, integrated source-sink inversion of atmospheric composition, atmospheric science big data analysis, and interactions between climate change and the atmospheric environment. He has published dozens of papers in Nature and Science portfolio journals and has more than 40,000 SCI citations. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in both Environment and Ecology and Geosciences.

Shuai Shao is Distinguished Professor and doctoral supervisor at East China University of Science and Technology, Deputy Dean of the School of Business, Deputy Director of the Research Center for Energy Economy and Environmental Management, Chief Expert of a major National Social Science Fund project, and recipient of the National Science Fund for Excellent Young Scholars. He has received many awards, including the Youth Achievement Award of the Outstanding Scientific Research Achievements in Higher Education Award in Humanities and Social Sciences, the Zhang Peigang Young Scholar Award in Development Economics, and the Liu Shibai Economics Award. His research focuses on energy economics and environmental management and regional sustainable development. He has published more than 170 papers in journals including Nature portfolio journals, The Energy Journal, World Development, and Economic Research Journal, and serves as an editor for World Development and Environmental Economics Research. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Ning Zhang is Dean and Professor at the Institute of Blue and Green Development, Shandong University, and Senior Fellow in the Department of Land Economy at the University of Cambridge. His main research areas include resource and environmental economics and sustainable development management. He serves as Associate Editor of the SSCI journal SSJ, Editorial Board Member of the ABS 3* journal Technological Forecasting and Social Change, and Academic Editor of China Population, Resources and Environment. He has published more than 100 papers in domestic and international journals including Science, Nature and its portfolio journals, Cell portfolio journals, Lancet portfolio journals, JDE, Economic Research Journal, and ABS four-star journals. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Dan Tong is Associate Professor in the Department of Earth System Science at Tsinghua University. She has received honors including MIT Technology Review Innovators Under 35 and the Alibaba DAMO Academy Young Fellow Award. Her research focuses on global anthropogenic atmospheric composition emission accounting, assessment of climate and environmental impacts locked in by global energy infrastructure, integrated energy-environment-economy assessment modeling, and coordinated governance for carbon neutrality and clean air. Many of her studies have been published in leading journals including Nature portfolio journals. In 2024, she was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Geosciences.

Bo Zheng is Associate Professor at the Institute of Environment and Ecology, Tsinghua Shenzhen International Graduate School. His research focuses on the atmospheric carbon cycle, atmospheric chemistry modeling, air quality management, and climate change response strategies. He has published dozens of papers in leading journals including Science, Science Advances, Nature portfolio journals, National Science Review, and Science Bulletin. He serves on the editorial boards of Earth System Science Data and Environmental Science & Ecotechnology. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Philippe Ciais is a member of the French Academy of Sciences, the European Academy of Sciences, and a foreign member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He is Deputy Director of the Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l Environnement (LSCE) and Professor at the University of Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ). He is current Chair of the Global Carbon Project, Chair of the Integrated Global Carbon Observation system, and a principal leader of Carbon Europe and Carbon Africa. He was a lead author of the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in both Environment and Ecology and Geosciences.

Pete Smith is Professor of Soils and Global Change at the University of Aberdeen and previously served as a Senior Scientific Officer at the Central Science Laboratory of the UK Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. His main research areas include greenhouse gas and carbon mitigation modeling, bioenergy, biochar carbon sequestration, global food system modeling, and greenhouse gas removal technologies. He is currently Science Director of Climate XChange, the Scottish climate change knowledge center, and previously served as Food Systems Director for SFSA-Crops and theme leader for Environment and Food Security at the University of Aberdeen. He has served as editor for Global Change Biology and Global Change Biology Bioenergy. His honors include the Royal Society-Wolfson Research Merit Award and fellowships of the Royal Society of Biology, the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Indian National Science Academy as a foreign fellow, the European Academy of Sciences, and the Royal Society. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in both Environment and Ecology and Agricultural Sciences.

Charles Godfrey is a population biologist with broad interests in environmental science and publications across fundamental and applied ecology, evolution, and epidemiology. He currently directs the Oxford Martin School and the Oxford Future of Food Programme. His research covers global food systems, population and community ecology, and evolutionary biology. He is particularly interested in how global food systems change and adapt under the challenges of the 21st century, especially the concept of sustainable intensification and the relationships among food production, ecosystem services, and biodiversity. He chaired the lead expert group for the UK Government Office for Science Foresight project on the Future of Food and Farming, and served as Chair of the Science Advisory Council of the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs from 2005 to 2021. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Klaus Hubacek is Professor of Ecological Economics at the Energy and Sustainability Research Institute Groningen and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in the United Kingdom. His research focuses on conceptualizing and modeling interactions between human and environmental systems and developing and modeling future change scenarios. He has published leading papers in journals including Nature portfolio journals and PNAS. He serves as an editor for several scientific journals, including Applied Energy and Journal of Industrial Ecology. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Karen C. Seto is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and Professor of Geography and Urbanization Science at the Yale School of the Environment. She has served as Co-Chair of the Urbanization and Global Environmental Change core science project under the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change, and as a member of the IPCC Human Settlements and Infrastructure Science Steering Committee. Her research focuses on the relationship between urbanization and global change, including land-use dynamics, urban expansion forecasting, land-use change, and the environmental effects of urban expansion. In 2024, she was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field.

Steven J. Davis is Professor in the Department of Earth System Science at the University of California, Irvine. His work seeks solutions to global demand for energy, food, and commodities in the context of climate change. He has published nearly 100 high-quality papers in Nature and Science and received the PNAS Cozzarelli Prize in 2014, along with multiple Global Top 100 Most Influential Paper Awards. In 2024, he was named a Highly Cited Researcher in Cross-Field. He was also named a Highly Cited Researcher in both Environment and Ecology and Geosciences.