On November 21, 2025, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) officially announced the results of its 2025 academician election. Professor Xu Tongwen from the Precision Synthesis Division of the State Key Laboratory of Precision Intelligent Chemistry was elected a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Xu Tongwen, male, of Han ethnicity, born in August 1967. He is a member of the China National Democratic Construction Association and a native of Huoqiu County, Anhui Province. He currently serves as a professor at the School of Chemistry and Materials Science, University of Science and Technology of China (USTC). He received his Bachelor's degree (1989) and Master's degree (1992) from Hefei University of Technology, and obtained his Ph.D. from Tianjin University in 1995. After completing his postdoctoral fellowship in Polymer Chemistry at Nankai University in 1997, he joined USTC. During his career, he has conducted collaborative research at the University of Tokyo, Tokyo Institute of Technology, and Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology in South Korea. He has been elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, a Fellow of the Chemical Industry and Engineering Society of China, and a Fellow of the Chinese Chemical Society. In 2025, he was elected a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Professor Xu Tongwen has long been dedicated to research in membrane chemical engineering. He has made systematic and original contributions in fundamental research on ion-exchange membranes, their industrial application, and their use in energy storage, hydrogen energy, and low-carbon transformation of process industries. He has published over 600 papers in journals including Nature, and has been included in Elsevier's list of Highly Cited Chinese Researchers for eleven consecutive years (2014–2024). He has also been consistently featured on Stanford University's list of the World's Top 2% Scientists (ranking 12th globally in the Chemical Engineering category in the 2024 Career-Long Impact List). He holds 110 authorized invention patents. His achievements have earned him one second-class prize from the National Technology Invention Award and seven first-class prizes at the provincial, ministerial, and industry association levels. He has also received the National May 1st Labor Medal, the Hou Debang Chemical Science and Technology Achievement Award, and the Special Government Allowance of the State Council.