# Xiao Cheng Zeng

Xiao Cheng Zeng is a scientist in physical chemistry and materials science. He currently serves as the Head of Department of Materials Science & Engineering and a Chair Professor of Materials Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at City University of Hong Kong. He is also an Emeritus Chancellor's University Professor at University of Nebraska–Lincoln (USA). He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a fellow of the American Physical Society, a fellow of US Materials Research Society, a fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry, and a foreign fellow of the European Academy of Sciences. He had also held a John Simon Guggenheim fellowship.

## Education

He received his bachelor degree in Physics from Peking University in 1984. He then pursued postgraduate study in US via CUSPEA program (created by Nobel Laureate in Physics Professor Tsung-Dao Lee), and received his Ph.D. in Condensed Matter Physics from the Ohio State University in 1989. Thereafter, he did his postdoctoral research in Physical Chemistry at University of Chicago (1989–1992) and UCLA (1992–1993).

## Career and research

As a computational physical chemist, Zeng has made original contributions to thermodynamics and phase transition of nanoconfined water/ice, and water/surface interaction and wetting; original contributions to gold-cluster science and nanocatalysis; atmospheric reactions; and computational design of low-dimensional materials.
Low-dimensional ice/ice hydrates: Zeng opened the field of low-dimensional ice/ice hydrates. In 1997, he predicted 2D bilayer hexagonal ice, nicknamed "the Nebraska ice"., a phase of water ice that is two-dimensional. And it was confirmed by two experiments: one by the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in 2009 and another by the Peking University in 2020. Thereafter, this 2D bilayer hexagonal ice is named 2D ice I. Moreover, his theoretical predictions of the 1D ices (1D ice-nanotubes I-III), "DNA-ice", ferroelectric ice-χ, and 2D amorphous, plastic, and superionic ices enriched ice family.
Gold-cluster science & nanocatalysis: In 2006, he discovered the first all-metal cage molecules (Au$_{16-18}$). Later, he resolved size/structure/catalytic-activity relationship of 20+ gold clusters; he also developed a grand-unified model to decipher structures of 70+ ligand-covered gold clusters.
Atmospheric reactions: Since 2015, he has found several new chemical reactions on water/cloud droplets with implications to atmospheric new particle formation and haze chemistry.
Computational design of low-dimensional materials: In 2011, he predicted 20+ metallic boron monolayer structures and created systematic naming series for these monolayers, including α, β, χ, and δ series; two in these series, χ$_3$-borophene and β$_{12}$-borophene were later confirmed by experiments.

## Publications & Citations

Zeng's scientific accomplishments are documented in more than 700 journal publications with 59000+ citations in Google scholar (H-index 122) and 50000+ in Web of Science (H-index 109). These publications include 7 in Nature/Science, 23 in Nature/Science Sister Journals, 26 in Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. (PNAS), 73 in Journal of the American Chemical Society (JACS), 30 in Angewandte Chemie/Advanced Materials, 9 in Phys. Rev. Lett./Phys. Rev. X, and 4 in Joule/Chem.

## Prizes and Honours

* Fellow, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation (2004)
* Fellow, American Physical Society (2005)
* Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (2007)
* Outstanding Research and Creative Activity Award, University of Nebraska (System Wide) (2010)
* Midwest Award, American Chemical Society (2011)
* Excellence in Graduate Education, Graduate College, UNL (2012)
* Outstanding Postdoc Mentor Award, UNL (2013)
* Fellow, Royal Society of Chemistry (2013)
* Surfaces & Interfaces Award, Royal Society of Chemistry (2017)
* Fellow, Materials Research Society (2019)
* Highly Cited Researcher, Clarivate Web of Science (2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024)
* Foreign Fellow, European Academy of Sciences, Chemistry Division (2020)