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Engineers and computer scientists among world’s most highly-cited
18 November 2021
Sydney researchers marking their place as global leaders
Six University of Sydney engineering and computer science researchers feature in the 2021 Clarivate Analytics Highly Cited Researchers List, following a string of achievements from across the Faculty of Engineering.
The 2021 Highly Cited Researchers List from Clarivate Analytics features six engineering and computer science academics from the Faculty of Engineering – an increase from four in 2020.
The Highly Cited Researchers List identifies researchers who demonstrated significant influence in their chosen field or fields through the publication of multiple highly cited papers during the last decade.
Their names are drawn from the publications that rank in the top 1 percent by citations for field and publication year in the Web of Science citation index.
Between the six featured academics, their research spans advancing machine learning, materials engineering, and developing more sustainable technologies.
The increase in the number of engineering and computer science academics named in the list is unsurprising according to Faculty of Engineering Associate Dean (Research), Professor Kim Rasmussen.
"Our researchers are using technology to develop cutting-edge solutions to some of the world’s greatest challenges", said Professor Rasmussen.
"The Faculty of Engineering is home to world-class researchers with an extensive range of expertise and experience, and I’m pleased to see our academics recognised in this year’s Highly Cited Researchers list."
The 2021 Faculty of Engineering Highly Cited Researchers
Professor PJ Cullen works with plasma in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. The ultimate goal of his research is the adoption of plasma technologies to move from the current reliance on traditional chemicals towards more targeted and environmentally friendly solutions to a range of global social, environmental and industrial challenges. This includes food, water and climate issues.
Professor Qing Li, School of Aerospace, Mechanical and Mechatronic Engineering, has recently focused his research on computational design and multidisciplinary optimisation of nonlinear and time-dependent multifunctional and lightweight structures and materials with applications in aerospace, automotive, mechanical, manufacturing and biomedical engineering.
His research expertise spans data science, computational mechanics, structural crashworthiness, additive manufacturing, biomechanics, scaffold tissue engineering and biofabrication. Professor Li has collaborated with domestic and global industry including Cochlear, Stryker, Allegra, SDI, Sirona, 360 Med Care, Optimize Ortho and Corin.
Dr Zengxia Pei, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, primarily researches elecrocatalysis, aqueous batteries, and hydrogel electrolytes. He was recognized as one of the Australian Research Top 40 Rising Stars in 2019 and 2020, and as a Clarivate Analytics Highly Cited Researcher in 2020. Currently he works on functional materials for sustainable energy conversion and storage.
Professor Dacheng Tao from the School of Computer Science has made ground-breaking contributions in artificial intelligence, computer vision image processing and machine learning. In 2017 he was awarded an ARC Australian Laureate Fellowship and in 2018 he was named a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science. He has won many prizes for his research contributions including a prestigious Eureka Prize. He is a member of the University's multidisciplinary initiative, the Brain and Mind Centre, and is among a select few academics to be named in the highly cited list in two fields – computer science and engineering.
Professor Dong Xu is Chair in Computer Engineering and ARC Future Fellow at the School of Electrical and Information Engineering. His current research interests include computer vision, multimedia and machine learning. His research group has developed new machine learning methods and intelligent systems for a broad range of vision and big data analytics related applications such as large-scale image/video retrieval, video surveillance, biometrics (i.e., face and human gait recognition) as well as medical image analysis.
Dr Shenlong Zhao, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, is researching porous carbon nanomaterials and their sustainable energy and catalysis applications, including photo/electrocatalysts and biofuel cells, and batteries. His research aims to provide solutions to the global energy challenge by transforming innovative ideas/materials into practical technology through high-quality research and development.
The growing number academics from the Faculty of Engineering included in the Highly Cited Researchers List achievement follows a string of achievements in engineering and computer science.
The Australian's 2021 Research Magazine saw Professor Dacheng Tao recognised as one of 40 lifetime achievers in their fields.
Additionally, Dr Zengxia Pei and Associate Professor Wanli Ouyang were named among 40 leaders of the future, while three international awards were recently granted to Sydney academics in the fields of engineering and computer science.