Professor
School of Earth and Space Sciences
Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
Education:
1. 2005 - 2010
Ph.D. in space physics. Advisors: Prof. Chuanyi Tu, Prof. Eckart Marsch
School of Earth and Space Sciences, Peking University, China
Max-Planck-Institute for Solar System Research, Germany
2. 2001 - 2005
Bachelor of Engineering
School of Electronic Information, Wuhan University, China
Employment:
1. 2015 - now
Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, Professor at School of Earth and Space Sciences, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
2. 2012 - 2015
Astrophysicist at Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
3. 2010 – 2012
ASP Postdoc Fellow at High Altitude Observatory, National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO 80301, USA
Research Interest:
1. Solar transition region
2. Sunspot and flare dynamics
3. Coronal heating and solar wind origin
4. Solar and stellar coronal magnetic field diagnostics
5. Stellar coronal activity and exoplanetary space weather
Honors:
1. 2023: XPlorer Prize
2. 2022: China Youth Science and Technology Award
3. 2020: Karen Harvey Prize, Solar Physics Division, American Astronomical Society
4. 2019: Young Researcher Award, Division of Plasma Physics, Association of Asian Pacific Physical Societies
5. 2018: Distinguished Young Scientist Award from the National Science Foundation of China
6. 2017: AOGS (Asia Oceania Geosciences Society) Early Career Researchers Distinguished Lecture
7. 2016: Head of Max Planck Partner Group, appointed by Max Planck Society, Germany
Invited talks at international conferences/workshops:
1. Prevalent Sub-arcsec Intermittent Jets in the Solar Atmosphere, 7th GST Workshop, Antalya, Turkiye, Feb 2-7, 2026, keynote talk
2. Mapping the global coronal magnetic field through 2D coronal seismology, The third China-Europe Solar Physics Meeting, Beijing, China, Sept 14-19, 2025, invited
3. Mapping the global coronal magnetic field of the Sun, International Symposium on Cosmic Magnetic Fields, Beijing, China, Oct 12-16, 2025, invited
4. The solar transition region: current understanding and future perspectives, 45th COSPAR Scientific Assembly (COSPAR 2024), Busan, South Korea, July 13-21, 2024, invited
5. Supersonic downflows into sunspots, 45th COSPAR Scientific Assembly (COSPAR 2024), Busan, South Korea, July 13-21, 2024, invited
6. The Relationship Between UV Bursts and Ellerman Bombs, AOGS 2024, Pyeongchang, South Korea, June 23-28, 2024, invited
7. Generation of solar spicules and subsequent atmospheric heating, Hinode-14/IRIS-11 workshop (e-conference), Oct 25-28, 2021, invited
8. Mapping the global magnetic field in the solar corona through magnetoseismology, 5th Asia-Pacific conference on Plasma Physics (e-conference), Sept.26-Oct.1, 2021, invited (plenary)
9. Magnetoseismology for the solar corona: from ~10 Gauss to coronal magnetograms, Royal Astronomical Society specialist discussion meeting “MHD oscillations and waves from the photosphere to the corona” (e-conference), May 14, 2021, invited
10. Prevalent transverse waves in the corona and their potential for mapping the coronal magnetic field, IIA-50 Conference "Advances in Observation and Modelling of Solar Magnetism and Variability", Bangalore, India and online, March 1-4, 2021, invited
11. Mapping the global magnetic field in the solar corona through magnetoseismology, MHD Coronal Seismology 2020: Twenty Years of Probing the Sun’s Corona with MHD Waves (e-conference), Dec. 8-11, 2020, invited
12. Spectroscopic observations of the upper solar atmosphere, The 51th AAS/SPD meeting (e-conference), August 18-19, 2020, invited
13. Prevalent small-scale jets in the solar atmosphere, The 13th Hinode Science Meeting, Tokyo, September 2-6, 2019, invited
14. BBSO/GST observations of fine structures and fast dynamics in sunspot light bridges, First ten years of GST workshop, Newark, U.S., March 12-15, 2019, invited
15. Observations of magnetic reconnection in the partially ionized lower solar atmosphere, 2nd Asia-Pacific conference on Plasma Physics, Kanazawa, Japan, Nov. 12-17, 2018, invited
16. Multiepisode Chromospheric Evaporation Observed in a Solar Flare, AOGS 2018, Honolulu, Hawaii, June 3-8, 2018, invited
17. The Solar Transition Region, AOGS 2017, Singapore, August 6-11, 2017, invited
18. The Solar Transition Region: Current Understanding and Future Perspectives, The 1st China-Europe Solar Physics Meeting, Kunming, May 15-19, 2017, invited
19. Observations and Simulations of Shock Waves in the Transition Region Above Sunspots, AOGS 2015, Singapore, August 2-7, 2015, invited
20. Connections Between Chromosphere,Transition Region and Corona: IRIS perspective, International conference on coupling and dynamics of the solar atmosphere, Pune, India, Nov 10-14, 2014, invited
21. IRIS observations of the solar wind source region, 2014 LWS/Hinode-8/IRIS-2 conference, Portland, Oregon, USA, Nov 3-6, 2014, invited
22. First results of NASA’s IRIS mission, 12th Scientific Assembly of the IAGA, Merida, Yucatan, Mexico, Aug 26-30, 2013, invited
23. Two components of the coronal emission revealed by both spectroscopic and imaging observations, SHINE 2012, Wailea Maui, Hawaii, USA, June 25-29, 2012, invited
24. The mass cycle between the chromosphere and the corona/solar wind, SDO-4 / IRIS / Hinode Workshop, Monterey, California, USA, March 12-16, 2012, invited
25. Crossing the transition region, Workshop From the Heliosphere into the Sun, Bad Honnef, Germany, Jan 31-Feb 3, 2012, invited
26. The solar transition region in the quiet Sun and active regions, AOGS 2009, Singapore, August 11-15, 2009, invited
Community Service and Professional Activities
1. Chief scientist of the Solar Polar-orbit Observatory mission, since 2025
2. Associate Editor of Living Reviews in Solar Physics, 2024-2027
3. Member of the Coronal Solar Magnetism Observatory (COSMO) Steering Committee, National Center for Atmospheric Research, USA, 2021-2026
4. Co-chair of the "Atmospheric Heating" science working group, ESA’s Solar Orbiter mission, 2021-2024
5. Scientific editor of Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics, 2023-2026
6. Editorial Board Member of Proceedings of the Royal Society A, since 2019
7. Leader of ISSI’s international team Diagnosing heating mechanisms in solar flares through spectroscopic observations of flare ribbons, 2016-2018
Selected Research Grants
1. Distinguished Young Scientist Award (continued), NSFC, 2024-2028, Principle-Investigator
2. Hunting for stellar coronal mass ejections and associated numerical simulations, NSFC, 2023-2025, Principle-Investigator
3. Distinguished Young Scientist Award, NSFC, 2019-2023, Principle-Investigator
Selected Peer-reviewed Publications
1. Gao, Y., Tian, H.*, Morton, R. J., et al. 2026, High-frequency magnetohydrodynamic waves with substantial energy in the solar polar corona, National Science Review, 13, nwag370
2. Zhang, J., Tian, H.*, Bellotti, S., et al. 2025, Starspots as the origin of ultrafast drifting radio bursts from an active M dwarf, Science Advances, 11, eadw6116
3. Deng, Y.*, Tian, H.*, Jiang, J., et al. 2025, Probing Solar Polar Regions, Chinese Journal of Space Science, 45, 913
4. Yang, Z.-H., Tian, H.*, Tomczyk, S., et al., 2024, Observing the evolution of the Sun’s global coronal magnetic field over 8 months, Science, 386, 76
5. Bai, X.-Y., Tian, H.*, Deng, Y.-Y., Wang, Z.-S.*, et al. 2023, The Solar Upper Transition Region Imager (SUTRI) Onboard the SATech-01 Satellite, Research in Astronomy and Astrophysics, 23, 065014
6. Tian, H., Harra, L., Baker, D., Brooks, D. H., Xia, L.-D. 2021, Upflows in the upper solar atmosphere, Solar Physics, 296, 47
7. Samanta, T.*, Tian, H.*, Chen, B., et al. 2021, Plasma heating induced by tadpole-like downflows in the flaring solar corona, The Innovation, 2, 100083
8. Yang, Z.-H., Bethge, C., Tian, H.*, Tomczyk, S.*, et al. 2020, Global maps of the magnetic field in the solar corona, Science, 369, 694
9. Samanta, T., Tian, H.*, Yurchyshyn, V., et al. 2019, Generation of solar spicules and subsequent atmospheric heating, Science, 366, 890
10. Samanta, T., Tian, H. *, Nakariakov, V. M. 2019, Evidence for Vortex Shedding in the Sun's hot corona, Physical Review Letters, 123, 035102
11. Chen, Y., Tian, H. *, Peter, H., et al. 2019, Flame-like Ellerman Bombs and Their Connection to Solar UV Bursts, Astrophys. J. Lett., 875, L30
12. Tian, H., Yurchyshyn, V., Peter, H., et al. 2018, Frequently Occurring Reconnection Jets from Sunspot Light Bridges, Astrophys. J., 854, 92
13. Tian, H., Young, P. R., Reeves, K. K., et al. 2016, Global sausage oscillation of solar flare loops detected by the Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph, Astrophys. J. Lett., 823, L16
14. Tian, H., DeLuca, E. E., Cranmer, S. R., et al. 2014, Prevalence of small-scale jets from the networks of the solar transition region and chromosphere, Science, 346, 1255711
15. Peter, H., Tian, H., Curdt, W., et al. 2014, Hot explosions in the cool atmosphere of the Sun, Science, 346, 1255726
16. Tian, H., McIntosh, S. W., Wang, T.-J., et al. 2012, Persistent Doppler shift oscillations observed with HINODE/EIS in the solar corona: Spectroscopic signatures of Alfvénic waves and recurring upflows, Astrophys. J., 759, 144