According to the funding announcement made by National Natural Science Foundation, Professor Li Xiaoyan from College of Resources Sciences and Technology and Land Utilization Research Team of ESPRE was awarded 2010 National Science Fund for Distinguished Young Scholars of China.

Professor Li has been involved in biological and land hydrological teaching and research with long-term field investigation and experimental analysis of the semi-arid area in northern China. He has made systemic achievements in land-plant-hydro interactions, and issued over 100 papers, of which 35 were SCI, and 17 were EI. SCI has been quoted for over 270 times and SCI of 12 times by H-index, some of them have been referred many times by key publications like Science and important international organizations such as CSIRO. He has been awarded many prizes including 100 National Excellent Doctorate Paper Prize, 2nd Prize of Beijing Science and Technology Award and 2nd Prize of State Natural Science Awards. He was also listed in the “Excellent Talent Support Plan in the New Century” of Ministry of Education and Beijing Excellent Talent Cultivation Plan. Professor Li hosted 3 projects supported by the National Natural Science Foundation, 1 project supported by the National Key Technology R&D Program 1 project supported by the National Basic Research Program (“973” Program) and also participated in over 10 national and provincial scientific research projects.

The set up for National Excellent Youth Science Foundation is to support for innovative research of young scholars. In 2010, 200 applicants were funded with a period of 4 years and RMB 2 million per person.