HKU Volcanologist Becomes First Hong Kong-Based Recipient of Prestigious Kamide Lecture Award

Professor Weiran Li, Assistant Professor of Volcanology and Petrology in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, received the 2026 Kamide Lecture Award in Solid Earth Sciences from the Asia Oceania Geosciences Society (AOGS), becoming the first Hong Kong-based researcher to be so honoured.

Founded in 2003, AOGS is one of the largest and most influential geoscience organisations in the Asia-Oceania region, with its annual meeting drawing thousands of scholars from approximately 50 countries. The Kamide Lecture Award, named after Professor Yohsuke Kamide, one of the three principal founders of AOGS, recognises outstanding young scientists aged 35 or under – or within seven years of receiving their PhD – who have made significant contributions in their fields. No more than two awards are made per scientific section each year.

Professor Li is a volcanologist and petrologist whose research spans magmatism, volatile cycles, and related topics on Earth and other planetary bodies. Her work addresses questions about the triggering mechanisms, history, and climatic impacts of large-magnitude volcanic eruptions, as well as crustal magma evolution and subduction-zone volatile cycling.

She received the award at the 23rd AOGS Annual Meeting in Fukuoka, Japan, where she delivered the Kamide Award Lecture, "Crystal Records of Magmatic Processes Driving Volcanic Eruptions: An Integrated Thermodynamic-Kinetic Perspective."

Professor Li holds a BSc, BA, and MSc from Peking University and a PhD from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. She conducted postdoctoral research at the Earth Observatory of Singapore and the University of Cambridge before joining HKU in 2022, where she established the VRock Laboratory and serves as Chief Curator of the Stephen Hui Geological Museum.