Research direction: Urban Spatial Dynamic Modeling; AI-driven Urban Planning; Sustainable Urban Regeneration

Zipan Cai is a Professor at the School of Architecture, Southeast University. He obtained his Bachelor’s degree in Geomatics and Computer Science from the University of Waterloo, Canada, in 2014, and his Master’s degree in Geoinformation Science and Doctoral degree in Land and Water Resources Engineering from the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Sweden, in 2017 and 2023, respectively. He previously served as a Visiting Scholar at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA, and as an Environmental Planning Engineer at AECOM. From July 2023 to January 2025, he was a Postdoctoral Researcher in Urban Planning at the School of Architecture and Built Environment, Lund University, Sweden, while concurrently holding positions as a Guest Researcher at KTH and a Core Research Member of the SATORI (GeoSpAtial daTa-mOdel-aRtificial Intelligence) Research Lab in Sweden.

His primary research focuses on urban spatial dynamics modeling, AI-driven urban planning, and sustainable urban regeneration. He specializes in assessing urban regeneration potential, simulating and optimizing urban evolution, and planning sustainable urban development pathways using multi-source geospatial data and deep learning technologies. In recent years, he has published nearly 10 papers as the first or corresponding author in internationally renowned journals, including two in Nature Climate Change (a top 1% interdisciplinary journal), which have been recognized as ESI Highly Cited Papers. His research achievements have been acknowledged by the International Science Council (ISC) Hundred-Person Review Panel, earning a nomination from Sweden and a place in the global finals of the 2025 Frontiers Planet Prize (a top-tier award in environmental science).

Currently, he serves as an Associate Editor for Humanities and Social Sciences Communications (Springer Nature) and as a Guest Reviewer for over 15 prestigious SCI/SSCI journals, including Nature Climate Change, Nature Communications, Ambio, Landscape Ecology, Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science, and Urban Planning. He has led several high-profile projects, including the National High-Level Young Talent Program (2024), two projects funded by the Lars Erik Lundberg Research and Education Foundation in Sweden, and a key laboratory project on carbon neutrality and territorial spatial optimization under the Ministry of Natural Resources of China. In 2024, he was appointed as a Distinguished Expert for the China Future City Council (CFCC) of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat).