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Lai has long been engaged in interdisciplinary research focusing on human behaviour, population dynamics, environmental changes, and infectious disease transmission and interventions. He has published ~200 book chapters and peer-reviewed papers in scientific journals, including Nature, Science, Lancet Infectious Diseases, Nature Medicine, Nature Human Behaviour, BMJ, and Nature Communications.
Research
Research groups
Research interests
- Lai is interested in understanding the transmission dynamics and intervention effectiveness for infectious diseases; Quantifying seasonal human mobility, social connectivity and migration using novel data sources, e.g. mobile phone data/digital traces; Investigating spatiotemporal interactions between human behaviour, environmental change and infectious disease dynamics.
Current research
Funded by several national and international funders, as PI/project lead/Co-I in ¾ÅÉ«ÊÓƵ, his research focuses on spatial demography and spatial epidemiology to model human population dynamics and reveal transmission risk of infectious diseases under environmental changes. Projects in the past five years:
- Machine learning for blue line tracing and wastewater surveillance, Gates Foundation, 2025-2026
- Mapping the risk of Guinea worm disease at a high resolution using geospatial and machine learning approaches, the Carter Centre, 2024-2026
- The fear of 'here': Integrating place-based travel behaviour and detection into novel infectious disease models, National Science Foundation, 2023-2026
- Giving Rural Actors Novel data and re-Useable tools to Lead public Action in Rural area (GRANULAR), Horizon Europe Guarantee (UKRI), 2022-2026
- Human mobility models to forecast disease dynamics and the effectiveness of public health interventions, National Institute for Health (NIH), 2021-2026
- Exploring the seasonality of COVID-19, Gates Foundation, 2021-2022
- MOnitoring Outbreak events for Disease surveillance in a data science context (MOOD), EU Horizon, 2020-2024
- Quantifying Dengue Importation Risk from Southeast Asia and Environmental Suitability of Secondary Transmission in China, National Natural Science Foundation of China, 2018-2021
Research projects
Active projects
Researchers:
Completed projects
Researchers:
Sponsor: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Publications
186 publications
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External roles and responsibilities
Name:
Frontiers in Epidemiology (Journal)
Role:
Member of editorial board
Year:
2021
Name:
International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation (Journal)
Role:
Editor
Year:
2021 - 2022
Name:
Infectious Diseases of Poverty (Journal)
Role:
Member of editorial board
Year:
2021 - 2025
Name:
Mobility modelling for displacement, migration and COVID-19 using mobile phone data
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2022
Name:
Presentation for the Session: Migration in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Using phylogeographical model and mobility data to understand the spread of variants in COVID-19 resurgence, in the session of Environment and Health Research
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Presenting in the session of GIScience-Informed Evaluations of COVID-19 Policy Responses
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Infectious Diseases of Poverty journal - 4th online webinar (IDEA Forum)
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Invited presentation in the session of Tropical Disease Situation in GMS and the Impact of COVID-19
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
Assessing the effects of travel and contact reductions to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic and resurgence
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
External examiner to examine a PhD thesis
Role:
Examiner
Year:
2020
Name:
Invited presentation for the Session: Big Data and Epidemics Response
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
Invited presentation in the Session: Data innovation for early warning and understanding of displacement and internal mobility
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
Invited talk in the Session of Ecosystem change, climate-sensitive disease, early warning and climate services
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Oral and poster presentations of international travel, internal migration and disease transmission
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Invited talk of the impact of seasonal population movements on mosquito-borne diseases transmission.
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Presenting how population movement could be estimated to help in determining the denominator at different administrative levels
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Presenting how to use mobile phone data for measuring internal migration
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Invited talk of The use of mobile phone data for tourism and migration statistics
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Invited presentation of exploring the use of mobile phone data for national migration statistics
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Presentation of mapping population and mosquito-borne disease connectivity
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2018
Name:
Field trip of malaria surveillance and invited presentation of mapping human movements and malaria connectivity
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2018
Name:
Presenting the methodology for estimating importation and onward transmission risks of mosquito-borne diseases via air travellers
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2018
Name:
Invited talk of Modelling the spreading risk and intervention effectiveness for infectious diseases
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2022
Name:
Invited talk on Measuring human mobility, COVID-19 spread risk and intervention effectiveness
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Invited talk of Measuring human mobility, COVID-19 spread risk and intervention effectiveness
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Biography
Prizes
- 2021 Vice-Chancellor's Awards - Early Career (2021)
- Dean’s Prize for Research (2019)
- Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed (non-government sponsored) Students Abroad (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 3rd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2022 Science and Technology Progress Award, Ministry of Education of P.R. China (2023)
- 2021 Vice-Chancellor's Awards - Early Career (2021)
- Dean’s Prize for Research (2019)
- Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed (non-government sponsored) Students Abroad (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 3rd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2022 Science and Technology Progress Award, Ministry of Education of P.R. China (2023)