Qingyan CHEN

Professor Qingyan CHEN serves as Chair Professor of Building Thermal Science and Director of the PolyU Academy for Interdisciplinary Research (PAIR) at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, where he leads the Department of Building Environment and Energy Engineering. As Director of PAIR, he oversees 11 research institutes and 6 research centers with over 500 senior researchers and manages more than HK$600 million in annual research funding.

His educational background includes a B.Eng. from Tsinghua University (1983), and M.Eng. and Ph.D. from Delft University of Technology (1985, 1988). Prior to his current position, he held academic appointments at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH-Zurich), TNO in the Netherlands, MIT, and Purdue University where he is now Professor Emeritus.

Professor CHEN is a world leader in developing healthy and comfortable built environments. His research spans computational fluid dynamics, indoor air quality, thermal comfort, and energy efficiency in buildings. He has made significant contributions to low-order turbulence models for CFD, including the indoor zero-equation model and fast fluid dynamics. During the COVID-19 pandemic, his research on infectious disease transmission in airplanes and cruise ships gained international attention and was reported by over 80 media outlets worldwide.

His recent publications demonstrate a continued focus on sustainable building technologies, infection control in confined spaces, and advanced computational methods for airflow and contaminant dispersion. The research output shows strong emphasis on practical applications of building science to address climate change and public health challenges.

• Fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of Engineering Sciences
• Fellow of the International Society of Indoor Air Quality and Climate
• Willis J. Whitfield Award (2007)
• John Rydberg Gold Medal (2011)
• Distinguished Achievement Award from IBPSA (2013)
• Global STEM Professor (2021)

Professor CHEN has secured over US$39 million in research funding throughout his career. He has co-supervised PhD students from multiple international institutions including Eindhoven University of Technology, University of Cagliari, University of Padua, and Queensland University of Technology. As Editor-in-Chief of the journal 'Building and Environment' from 2008 to 2024, he helped grow the journal to publish over 1,000 papers annually.

Through PAIR, Professor CHEN directs interdisciplinary research efforts across sustainable cities, health and well-being, and advanced technologies. His work has established significant collaborations with institutions worldwide and has been featured by major media outlets including CNN, BBC, The New York Times, and CCTV.