Education

B.S., Chemistry, 1983, Zhengzhou University

M.S., Chemical Physics, 1986, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Ph.D., Chemical Physics, 1990, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Resume

Prof. Zhongmin Liu is the Director of Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics(DICP), Chinese Academy of Sciences(CAS); Director of National Engineering Research Center of Lower-Carbon Catalysis Technology and National Energy Low-carbon Catalysis and Engineering R&D Center.

Prof. Liu has long been working with the catalysis research, process development, and technology transfer in energy conversion and utilization, and made significant achievements. In 2006, as a leading scientist, Professor Liu, together with partners and his colleagues, finished the first industrial demonstration test of methanol to olefin process, named as DMTO. Based on DMTO technology the world’s first commercial unit of MTO process was constructed and started to operate by Shenhua group in 2010, which was an important progress for coal to chemicals, and provides a new chance for the substitution of oil by coal. So far, DMTO technology has been licensed to 32 units with a total olefins production capacity of 21.60Mt/a. And 17 commercial DMTO units have been put into stream with olefins production capacity exceeding 10.0 Mt/a. This breakthrough leads coal to olefins to a new industrial sector in China, greatly changes Chinese light olefins supply, and impacts the light olefins market worldwide. Professor Liu also developed coal-based ethanol production technology, via carbonylation of dimethylether and further hydrogenation, and finished its comerciallization by construction of a world’s first plant (100KTA) in 2017, which demonstrates a new way for the clean utilization of coal. Up to now, 13 DMTE units have been licensed with the ethanol production capacity of 3.95 Mt/a. As DMTE technology can turn the relatively abundant coal resources not food into ethanol, it can safeguard China’s food supply while reduce air pollution.

Prof. Liu has published more than 500 research papers and got 500 authorized patents or more. He also received many awards in his scientific career, including The First Class of the National Technological Invention Awards (2014), The First Class of the National Scientific and Technological Progress Award (2017), Chinese Catalytic Achievement Award (2017), AIChE Professional Achievement Award for Innovations in Green Process Engineering (2018), Highest Science and Technology Awards of Liaoning Province (2019), etc.