Dr Kenneth Leung

Croucher Fellowship in 2000

Dr. Kenneth Leung obtained a BSc degree in Applied Environmental Sciences with first class honours at University of Portsmouth in England in 1993, and accomplished his MPhil study in Environmental Science at City University of Hong Kong in 1996.  As a recipient of the Swire’s James Henry Scott PhD Scholarship, he undertook a doctoral study at University of Glasgow in Scotland and obtained his PhD in Marine Ecotoxicology in 2000.  He was subsequently awarded The Croucher Foundation Fellowship, enabling him to conduct his 18-month postdoctoral study in ecological risk assessment of antifouling biocides at Royal Holloway, University of London in England (2000-2001).

Dr. Leung firstly joined The University of Hong Kong as Research Assistant Professor in January 2002 and was promoted to Assistant Professor and Associate Professor (Tenured) in 2003 and 2009, respectively.  He was a recipient of the "Marine Pollution Bulletin Highly Cited Author Award [2005-2009]" by Elsevier and the "Award for Service Contribution 2010" by Faculty of Science, The University of Hong Kong.  Over the past, he was invited by the Food and Agriculture Organisation to develop a manual for assessing ecological risks of aquaculture practices, and frequently invited by the United Nations (UNDP/PEMSEA) to give lectures on ecological risk assessment in their regional training workshops.  Since June 2010, he has been serving as the elected President for the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry (SETAC) Asia/Pacific Geographical Unit.  Owing to his professional achievements and community services, Dr. Leung was selected as one of the "Ten Outstanding Young Persons 2010" by Junior Chamber International Hong Kong.

Current work

At present, Dr. Kenneth Leung is Associate Professor in the School of Biological Sciences, at The University of Hong Kong where he also serves as the Programme Director for the MSc Programme in Environmental Management, Resident Scientist of the Swire Institute of Marine Science, and Warden of Morrison Hall.  His research interests include marine ecology, ecotoxicology, ecological risk assessment, and marine biodiversity and conservation.  Up to 2012, he has already published more than 90 peer-reviewed articles on these subjects. 

For example, he established a novel approach, namely the field-based species sensitivity distribution (f-SSD), to derive ecologically relevant and site-specific sediment quality guidelines of chemical pollutants for providing better protection to marine benthic ecosystems in Norway and Hong Kong.  His method has been adopted as a means for deriving supplementary sediment quality guidelines in New Zealand, supporting the European water Framework Directive Quality Standards for metals, and also being employed by the US Environmental Protection Agency to examine effects of metals on benthic communities. 

Currently, Dr. Leung is a subject editor for Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management, and serves as an editorial board member for Marine Pollution Bulletin, Integrative Zoology, Canadian Journal of Zoology and Toxicology and Environmental Health Sciences.  He is also an appointed expert member in a number of advisory committees for the Hong Kong SAR Government such as the Research Projects Vetting Subcommittee for Environment and Conservation Fund (2006 – present), Marine Mammal Conservation Working Group (2007 – present),  Red Tide/HAB Expert Advisory Group (2010 – present), Endangered Species Advisory Committee (2010 – present), Genetic Modified Organisms (Control of Release) Expert Group (2011 – present) and Marine Parks Committee (2011 – present).