Dr. Hefa Cheng is currently a Boya Distinguished Professor in the College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University. He holds a Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering, with a Ph.D. minor in Geological and Environmental Sciences from Stanford University, and M.S. (University of Oklahoma) and B.S. (Summa Cum Laude, East China Normal University) degrees in Environmental Science. His research interests focus on characterizing the environmental behavior of organic pollutants and heavy metals in soil and aquatic environments based on laboratory and field investigation and understanding the environmental problems arising from energy use through system analysis. He is the author/co-author of over 260 papers in SCI-indexed journals, including Nat. Clim. Change, Nat. Commun., Environ. Sci. Technol., and Wat. Res.  He was named as one of Clarivate’s Highly Cited Researchers in 2024. He was also a recipient of the Outstanding Overseas Talent program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (2009), the National Program for Support of Top-notch Young Professionals (2012), the Research Fund for Excellent Young Scholars from the National Natural Science Foundation (2013), the Changjiang Young Scholar by the Ministry of Education (2015), and the National Natural Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars (2017). He currently serves as an Associate Editor of Environment International, Environmental Pollution, and Heliyon.