Our Team

Dr Pai Zheng (F’ASME, SM’IEEE, M’SME/HKIE, AM’CIRP) is currently an Associate Professor, Wong Tit-Shing Endowed Young Scholar in Smart Robotics, and Director, National Centre of Technology Innovation for Intelligent Design and Numerical Control (NCDC) – Hong Kong Branch, in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU). Before joining PolyU, he has been a Research Fellow at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (2018–2019).

He received the Dual Bachelor’s Degrees in Mechanical Engineering (Major) and Computer Science and Engineering (Minor) from Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, China, in 2010, the Master’s Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Beihang University, Beijing, China in 2013, and the Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering at The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand in 2017.

His research interests include human-robot collaboration, smart product-service systems, and industrial embodied intelligence. Dr Zheng is a recipient of the Clarivate High Cited Researchers (2025 – ), HKIE Young Engineer of the Year Award (2025), SME Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineers Award (2024), NSFC Excellent Young Scientist Fund (2024), PolyU Young Innovative Researcher Award (2023), and Global Top 50 AI+X Chinese Scholars by Baidu (2022). He is a Fellow of ASME, Senior Member of IEEE/CMES, and Member of HKIE/SME, Associate Member of CIRP, and serves as the Chair of IEEE Hong Kong Section SMC Chapter, Co-chair of IEEE TC on DMHCA, Scientific Committee Member of SME | NAMRI, Associate Editor of Journal of Manufacturing Systems, IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, and International Journal of Interactive Design & Manufacturing.

Dr. Liqiao XIA is currently a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, HKSAR.

Before this, he was a Visiting Research Fellow at the Vienna University of Technology, Austria, and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany, and a Postdoctoral Scholar in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at Case Western Reserve University, USA.

He received his Ph.D. in Industrial and Systems Engineering from The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, HKSAR, in 2024 and was a Visiting Graduate Student at the Institute for Manufacturing, University of Cambridge, UK.

His research interests include human-robot collaboration, smart manufacturing systems, prognostics and health management, etc.

He has published numerous papers in prestigious journals, such as IEEE Trans. (TII, TMECH, TIM, TR, TBD) and RESS, among others.