Rate My Professor Zhongdong Wang

Professor Zhongdong Wang is a Professor of High Voltage Engineering in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at The University of Manchester, heading the Transformer and Dielectric Liquid Research Group within the Electrical Energy and Power Systems Group. She earned her BEng degree in High Voltage Engineering and MSc degree in High Voltage Technologies from Tsinghua University, Beijing, China, in 1991 and 1993, respectively, and her PhD in Electrical Engineering from UMIST in 1999. Having joined the University of Manchester (then UMIST) in 2000, she progressed to her current professorship and also holds the position of Associate Dean for Internationalisation in the Faculty of Science and Engineering. Her career is marked by dedication to advancing high voltage engineering research and education.

Professor Wang's academic interests encompass condition monitoring techniques for power transformers, thermal, electrical transient, and magnetic modeling, insulation ageing mechanisms, pre-breakdown and breakdown phenomena, and the development of alternative liquid insulating materials, especially environmentally friendly substitutes for mineral oil. She leads pioneering work on asset management and sustainable power systems, with impacts including the application of environmentally friendly and fire-safe transformer liquids, reducing customer bills through flexible demand response, and minimizing infrastructure investment for decarbonisation, aligned with UN Sustainable Development Goals such as Affordable and Clean Energy. Recognized for her contributions, she received the Best Paper Award at the CIGRE Paris Session 2018 (shared with P. Jarman, X. Zhang, M. Daghrah, Q. Liu) and chaired the 2017 IEEE 19th International Conference on Dielectric Liquids. As a Member of the Institution of Engineering and Technology (MIET) and IEEE (MIEEE), she has produced 191 research outputs cited over 7,800 times. Key publications include "Breakdown Characteristics of Transformer Liquids with Winding Conductor Segments under Lightning Impulse" (H. Yu, Q. Liu, Z. Wang et al., IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation, 2025), "Effect of Applied Electric Field on Conductivity of Synthetic Ester Impregnated Kraft Paper" (R. Yu, S. Matharage, Z. Wang, IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation, 2025), "Effect of Electrical Field on Conductivity of Synthetic Ester Induced by Space Charge Accumulation" (R. Yu, S. Matharage, S. Shen, Z. Wang et al., IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation, 2025), and "Impact of cellulose degradation on space charge dynamics and dielectric properties of Kraft paper impregnated with ester liquid in comparison with mineral oil" (A. M. Alshehawy, S. Matharage, Z. Wang, Electrical Materials and Applications, 2025).