Prof. Irene Lo
The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
Hong Kong
Prof. Irene Lo is currently a Chair Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. She is an elected Member of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts and an elected Fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of Engineering Sciences. She is also a Fellow of the Hong Kong Institution of Engineers and a Fellow of the American Society of Civil Engineers. In 2017, she was appointed as a Justice of the Peace (JP) by the HKSAR Government. She has served as an Adjunct Professor at Tongji University, Tianjin University, Jilin University, and Harbin Institute of Technology, and has been a Visiting Professor at the Technical University of Denmark and the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Prof. Lo is an internationally renowned scholar and one of the first to develop iron-based nanomaterials and photocatalytic materials for the removal of heavy metals, organic contaminants, and emerging pollutants such as antibiotics from water and subsurface environments. Her work has significantly advanced the fundamental understanding of pollutant removal mechanisms. Her research is recognized for being groundbreaking, innovative, sustainable, and cost-effective in real-world applications. She has received numerous prestigious international research awards, including the 2025 Career Award, 2025 IETI Distinguished Fellow, 2023 HKIE Environmental Best Paper Award, 2021 ES&T Best Critical Review Paper Awards, 2019 Higher Education Outstanding Scientific Research Output Awards, 2012 ASCE EWRI Best Practice-Oriented Paper Award, 2009 ASCE Wesley W. Horner Award, and the 2007 ASCE Samuel Arnold Greeley Award, among others. She has delivered more than 100 plenary, keynote, and invited lectures at international and regional conferences across Asia, Europe, Africa, and North America. Her research impact is widely recognized, with over 23,400 citations and an H-index of 81 (Google Scholar). She has been listed among the “Top 2% Scientists in the World” by Stanford University consistently since 2019.
