Speaker — Neptune Forum 2026
Minhan Dai
Director of the Fujian Ocean Innovation Center
China, Xiamen — Xiamen University
Fujian Ocean Innovation Center
Minhan Dai is Chair professor at Xiamen University, Honorary Director of the State Key Laboratory of Marine Environmental Science (MEL), and Director of the Fujian Ocean Innovation Center. He is an internationally recognized leader in marine biogeochemistry. He led the development of the most comprehensive inventory of China’s marine carbon fluxes and carbon sinks, and established a theoretical framework for carbon cycling in marginal seas. His work has provided critical scientific underpinnings for the emerging ocean carbon sink industry and blue finance innovation, bridging fundamental science with policy and economic applications. He has published more than 290 peer-reviewed articles in leading international journals and is listed among Elsevier’s Highly Cited Chinese Researchers. He was elected an Academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2017 and has received numerous prestigious honors, including the First Prize of the Ministry of Education Natural Science Award, the National Innovation Award, the AOGS Axford Medal (2022), and the AGU Ambassador Award (2024). He is deeply engaged in global ocean governance and international cooperation, serving on expert groups for GO2NE and the High-level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy. He is a council member of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED), co-chaired SOLAS (2021-2023), and is the Lead PI for the UN Ocean Decade project COASTAL-SOS.
