Profile
An experimentalist who computes.
Full training at the bench, full fluency in first-principles computation, years spent teaching robots to run reactions — the group’s closed loop is autobiographical.
Prof. Chen Zhu朱宸 - Position
- Associate Professor · Research Professor · PhD advisor
- Adjunct
- Doctoral advisor, Shanghai Jiao Tong University & USTC
- At EIT since
- August 2023 · independent PI
- chen.zhu@eitech.edu.cn
Chen Zhu is an Associate Professor — Research Professor and PhD advisor — in the College of Science at the Eastern Institute of Technology, Ningbo, where he has run an independent laboratory since August 2023, selected the same year for the NSFC Excellent Young Scientists Fund (Overseas). One conviction runs through the career: making molecules and computing them are not two disciplines but one.
He took all three degrees at RWTH Aachen University: a BSc (2014) in the laboratory of the late Dieter Enders, a pioneer of asymmetric organocatalysis, then an MSc (2017) and a PhD (2019) with Magnus Rueping. Completed in two years, the doctorate was awarded summa cum laude; RWTH Aachen subsequently recognized that distinction with the Borchers-Plakette in 2019.
At the KAUST Catalysis Center, he worked first as a postdoctoral fellow and then as a Research Scientist, spending 2020–2023 on an automated synthesis platform built with Chemspeed robotics. The work connected mechanistic reasoning, machine execution, and experimental feedback in one research workflow.
The same integrated approach now shapes the group's work in Ningbo. Light- and electricity-driven synthesis — including current work in alternating-current photoelectrocatalysis (AC-PEC) — is developed alongside DFT mechanism studies and an automated platform linking design, experiment, and feedback in one workflow.
Trajectory
Aachen, Thuwal, Ningbo.
A measured record from Aachen to Thuwal and Ningbo — bench chemistry, first-principles computation, and automated synthesis converging in one laboratory.
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2010–2014
BSc, Chemistry
RWTH Aachen University · Germany
Enders laboratory
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2014–2017
MSc, Chemistry
RWTH Aachen University · Germany
Rueping laboratory
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2017–2019
PhD, Chemistry
RWTH Aachen University · Germany
Rueping laboratory
summa cum laude · Borchers-Plakette
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2019–2020
Postdoctoral Fellow
KAUST Catalysis Center · Saudi Arabia
Rueping laboratory
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2020–2023
Research Scientist
KAUST Catalysis Center · Saudi Arabia
automated synthesis platform
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2023–present
Associate Professor, independent PI
Eastern Institute of Technology, Ningbo · China
College of Science
Output & recognition
Indicators and honors.
Dated bibliometric indicators are followed by selected honors; current profile links appear at the end of the page.
Figures as of July 2026 · Google Scholar & Essential Science Indicators
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2023
NSFC Excellent Young Scientists Fund (Overseas)
China’s national program for high-level young scientists recruited from overseas.
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2023–2025
World’s Top 2% Scientists
The Stanford–Elsevier ranking of the world’s most-cited scientists — listed three consecutive years.
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2019
Doctorate summa cum laude & Borchers-Plakette
The doctorate graded with highest honors, and the medal RWTH Aachen reserves for that grade.
Profiles & links
Current profiles.
For current publication and profile information, see Google Scholar, ORCID, and the university’s faculty page.
Nature CatalysisNature ChemistryNature SynthesisNature CommunicationsAngew. Chem. Int. Ed.J. Am. Chem. Soc.
The fuller story is in the work.