Xun-Li Wang 王循理

  • Senior Research Fellowship in 2021 at City University of Hong Kong

Professor Xun-Li Wang is a Chair Professor of Physics, City University of Hong Kong. He graduated from Peking University with a B.S. in Physics and went to the US as a CUSPEA scholar, receiving a PhD in Physics from Iowa State University.

Prior to joining City University of Hong Kong in 2012, he had been working at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in the US, rising through the ranks to Distinguished Staff Member. He was responsible for the design, construction, and commissioning of VULCAN, a powerful engineering diffractometer at the Spallation Neutron Source, Oak Ridge National Laboratory. As a senior scientist in the Neutron Science Directorate, he led innovative research, using neutron scattering as a primary tool, to understand deformation and phase transformation behaviour in complex materials.

While in Hong Kong, Professor Wang has dedicated his efforts to establishing Hong Kong as an international hub for neutron scattering research. With the support from The Croucher Foundation, he started the biennial Croucher Summer Course on Neutron Scattering. He was also instrumental in launching the Gordon Research Conference series on Neutron Scattering, serving as the inaugural Chair in 2015. In addition, he and Professor Hesheng Chen of the Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, co-founded a joint laboratory on neutron scattering. The joint laboratory has received financial support from The Croucher Foundation, Hong Kong's Research Grants Council, and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In 2020, Professor Wang helped establish the Guangdong-HongKong-Macau Joint Laboratory on Neutron Scattering, serving as the Executive Director in Hong Kong. In the meanwhile, Professor Wang has maintained an active research portfolio. His current research interests include structure and dynamics in metallic glass, deformation behaviours in high entropy alloys, and magneto-elastic coupling in magnetic shape memory alloys.

Honours

  • Croucher Senior Research Fellowship, the Croucher Foundation (2021)
  • Elected Fellow, Neutron Scattering Society of America (2020)
  • Lee Hsun Lectureship, Chinese Academy of Sciences (2018)
  • Elected Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (2017)
  • Elected Fellow, American Physical Society (2010)

Services

  • Member, Board of Directors of the American Physical Society (2024 – present)
  • International Councillor, American Physical Society (2023 – present)
  • Editor, Aca Materialia & Scripta Materialia (2021 – present)
  • Co-Chair, Gordon Research Conference on Structural Nanomaterials, Les Diablerets, Switzerland (2024)
  • Inaugural Chair, Gordon Research Conference on Neutron Scattering, Hong Kong (2015)