Tianyi Ma

SUMMARY
 
Tianyi Ma is a RMIT University Distinguished Professor, an Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry, and Clarivate’s Global Highly Cited Researcher. He is Director of ARC Industrial Transformation Hub for Intelligent Energy Efficiency in Future Protected Cropping (E2Crop), and Research Director of Centre for Atomaterials and Nanomanufacturing (CAN). His international standing is evidenced by >400 publications in top-tier journals with an H-index of 95 and >40,000 citations. His ground-breaking research has been acknowledged by internationally recognised experts and authorities via 2024 Prime Minister's Prize for Science - the Malcolm McIntosh Prize for Physical Scientist of the Year, Australian Academy of Science's Le Févre Medal, Young Tall Poppy Science Award, ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award, and Horizon Prize of Royal Society of Chemistry. His scientific impact and leadership are also evidenced by supervision of over 30 Ph.D. students, secured more than AU$40m in government and industry funding, and heavy engagement in international academic roles, such as Associate Editor, Editorial Board Member and Guest Editor for over 10 international journals. He focuses on developing fundamental scientific breakthroughs and also up-scaling prototypes with far-reaching industry influence and real-life applications. Demonstrations and pilot plants have been established locally in Australia to drive his technologies to practical deployment and commercialisation, for example, the square meter sized solar-to-hydrogen generator, kilowatt level CO2 electrolyser, kilogram-sale formic acid production micro-pilot plant, and high-energy density battery packs, which change the way how society generates and consumes energy and chemicals.
 
ACHIEVEMENT
 
Tianyi Ma has multi-national, multi-university experience at several top universities. He obtained his PhD from Nankai University, one of the top universities in China. Then, he worked at the University of Adelaide, University of Newcastle, and Swinburne University of Technology across different states of Australia. He is now a Distinguished Professor in the School of Science at RMIT University. He was awarded an Australian Research Council (ARC) Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) in 2014 and an ARC Future Fellow in 2021, both of which are competitive fellowship schemes. He was made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC) in 2021, which is a prestigious honour to those who have made an outstanding contribution to the advancement of chemical sciences.
 
He is a leading scientist in the renewable energy field, with pioneering work conducted in areas of functional photocatalytic, electrocatalytic, thermocatalytic and piezocatalytic materials for renewable solar, mechanical and thermal energy harvesting and utilisation, as well as carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS). These processes have been further incorporated into his developed next-generation high-performance battery and supercapacitor-based energy storage devices. He has published over 400 peer-reviewed journal papers (312 as the first or corresponding author, 289 with a journal impact factor > 10, 79 with a journal impact factor > 20, 19 with a journal impact factor > 30, and > 40 invited reviews) in top-tier journals such as Nature Communications, Angewandte Chemie International Edition, Journal of the American Chemical Society, and Advanced Materials. In total, his papers have attracted over 40,000 citations with an H-index of 95. The substantial impact is also evidenced by 64 of his papers being ranked as ESI Top 1% or 0.1% Highly Cited Papers, resulting in him being ranked as the Clarivate’s ESI Highly Cited Researcher in both Materials Science and Chemistry fields, standing among Top 1% of the global researchers.
 
He has supervised 35 PhD students, many of whom have received research awards and scholarships at multiple levels. He is actively engaged in organising international and domestic conferences, and has given more than 30 plenary, keynote and invited talks. His professional leadership is also evidenced by heavy engagement in academic roles including serving as the Associate Editor or Editorial Board Member for many journals such as Small, Science Bulletin, Materials Reports: Energy, Rare Metals, and Journal of Electronic Materials; 10 themed issues were published by him as the leading guest editor.
 
As chief investigator, he has secured over $40m funding from the Federal Government, the Victorian State Government, and industry partners to conduct innovation work, which is not only fundamentally significant but also shows far-reaching impact for industry. Via ARC Linkage, CSIRO Collaboration, AusIndustry R&D Finding, CRC-P, ARNEA and CCUS-Technology Projects, he has established substantial collaborations with industry partners including South East Water, Viva Energy, Deloitte Emission Solution, Siemens Australia, Loy Yang Electricity, Advanced Carbon Energy, GrapheneX, and EntX. The lab-scale renewable energy devices and systems based on his game-changing functional materials and technologies have since been up-scaled to prototype demonstrations and pilot plants. He plays a key role as the group leader, chief investigator and critical initiator in securing these industry-directed funds.
 
He is now leading the Carbon Neutrality Group at RMIT, all while collaborating with researchers from the USA, UK, China, Japan, Korea, Canada, India, Saudi Arabia and other regions. He aims to combine aforementioned revolutionary technologies focusing on all sectors of the renewable energy supply chain to eventually achieve global carbon neutrality.
 
AWARD
 
2024 Recipient, Prime Minister’s Prize - Malcolm McIntosh Prize for Physical Scientist of the Year, Australia
2024 Recipient, Australian Financial Review (AFR) Higher Education Awards – Emerging Leader
2024 Finalist, Falling Walls Science Breakthroughs of the Year (Category: Engineering & Technology), Falling Walls Foundation, Germany
2023 Australian Nominee for the 2023 APEC Science Prize for Innovation, Research and Education (ASPIRE Prize), Department of Industry, Science and Resources, Australia
2023 Fellow of International Association of Advanced Materials (FIAAM), International Association of Advanced Materials (IAAM), Sweden
2023 ESI Highly Cited Researchers - Top 1% in Chemistry, Clarivate
2023 ESI Highly Cited Researchers - Top 1% in Materials Science, Clarivate
2023 Horizon Prize - The John Jeyes Award (awarded as the team leader), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
2023 Le Févre Medal, Australian Academy of Science, Australia
2023 ChemComm Pioneering Investigator, Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
2022 ESI Highly Cited Researchers - Top 1% in Chemistry, Clarivate
2022 ESI Highly Cited Researchers - Top 1% in Materials Science, Clarivate
2022 Young Tall Poppy Science Award, Australian Institute of Policy and Science
2021 Future Fellowship, Australian Research Council (ARC), Australia
2021 ESI Highly Cited Researchers - Top 1% in Cross-Field, Clarivate
2021 Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
2021 Emerging Investigator of Materials Horizons, Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC)
2020 ESI Highly Cited Researchers - Top 1% in Cross-Field, Clarivate
2020 Global Peer Review Award - Top 1% of Reviewers, Clarivate
2020 Outstanding Associate Editor Award, Frontiers Publishing Group
2019 Global Peer Review Award - Top 1% of Reviewers, Clarivate
2018 Emerging Investigator of Journal of Materials Chemistry, Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), UK
2014 Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA, 15% success rate), Australian Research Council (ARC), Australia