Rate My Professor Xiwang Zhang

Professor Xiwang Zhang holds the Endowed Dow Chair in Sustainable Engineering Innovation at the University of Queensland in the School of Chemical Engineering. He serves as Director of the UQ Dow Centre for Sustainable Engineering Innovation and Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Green Electrochemical Transformation of Carbon Dioxide (GetCO2). Prior to joining UQ in early 2022, he was the Founding Director of the ARC Industry Transformation Research Hub for Energy-efficient Separation (EESep) and Deputy Director of the Monash Centre for Membrane Innovation (MCMI) at Monash University. Professor Zhang possesses over 15 years of research and development experience across academia and industry, with demonstrated achievements in technology development and translation. His academic background includes a PhD from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a Master of Environmental Engineering from Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology, and a Bachelor of Environmental Engineering from China University of Mining and Technology.

Professor Zhang's research centers on membrane and advanced oxidation technologies for energy-efficient separation, water and wastewater treatment, resource recovery, green chemical synthesis, carbon dioxide conversion, and renewable energy generation. He has earned prestigious accolades such as the ARC Australian Research Fellowship, ARC Future Fellowship, Monash Larkins Fellowship, and election as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering in 2024. His extensive publication portfolio features influential works including 'Confined polymerization in nanochannels for synthesizing functional membranes' in Nature Synthesis (2026), 'Quantifying effective dehydrated ion sizes based on pore-ion steric properties to predict separation selectivity' in Angewandte Chemie - International Edition (2026), 'Reversible Bond Dynamics Enable Crystallinity‐Healed COF Membranes for Selective Ion Transport' in Small (2026), 'Chelator-Enhanced nanofiltration process for selective lithium extraction and magnesium utilization from salt lake brines' in Separation and Purification Technology (2025), and 'Reconstruction and analysis of pore blockage fouling in ceramic ultrafiltration membranes through FIB-SEM' in Nature Communications (2025). Professor Zhang currently supervises 22 Doctor of Philosophy students and leads major funded projects, including ARC Centres of Excellence and Linkage Projects focused on sustainable production of nanosheets, hydrogen from used water, and pore engineering for bioseparation.