I am a dedicated Ph.D. candidate in Environmental Science at The University of Manchester 
, with a focused research agenda on leveraging generative AI and physics-informed deep learning (PINNs) to address complex urban climate challenges. Positioned at the intersection of climate science and data-driven modeling, my work explores the transformative capabilities of generative frameworks and physically grounded neural networks in advancing urban climate understanding. Specifically, my research develops physics-guided deep learning approaches to characterize urban surface-atmosphere interactions; integrates machine learning with numerical climate models to improve the representation of urban morphology; and employs generative AI models to simulate adaptive urban climate scenarios with high spatial fidelity and physical realism.
🔥 News
- 2025.10: 🎉🎉 Awarded the NeurIPS 2025 Scholar Award!
- 2025.10: 🎉🎉 🔥🔥 My PhD first project has been accepted to NeurIPS 2025! To the best of our knowledge, it will be the first urban climate study to appear at a top-tier AI venue.
- 2025.05: Oral presentation accepted for the 12th International Conference on Urban Climate (Session S1: Digital Twins, AI/ML, and Open Data Science for Urban Climate); presentation forthcoming.
- 2025.03: 🎉🎉 Awarded the Doctoral Training and Development Support Fund by The University of Manchester!
- 2025.01 Appointed as a Graduate Teaching Assistant for The Natural Scientists Toolkit course (2024–2025) at The University of Manchester.
- 2024.11: 🎉🎉 My academic homepage is online!
🗂 Projects
AutoML-optimized LCZ Mapping Framework & Urban Climate Modeling
Jiyang Xia, Yuan Sun, Fenghua Ling, Xinyue Ye, David Topping, Zhonghua Zheng
[Key Points]
[Learning Urban Climate Dynamics via Physics-Guided Urban Surface–Atmosphere Interactions]
Jiyang Xia, Fenghua Ling, Zhenhui Jessie Li, Junjie Yu, Hongliang Zhang, David Topping, Lei Bai, Zhonghua Zheng
[Key Points]
- Urban Climate
- Physics-guided ML
- Represent Learning
- Multi-task
📝 Publications
- Jiyang Xia, Yue Zhang*. Where Are Potential Areas for Transit-Oriented Development (TOD)—Exploring the Demands for Built Environment for TOD Planning. Sustainability. 2022, 14, 8364.
- Jiyang Xia, Yue Zhang*. Research on Spatial Spillover Effect of Highly Educated Migrants in Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomerations Based on Urban Innovation. Areal Research and Development. 2022, 1, 162-168.
🎖 Honors and Awards
- 2025.10 NeurIPS 2025 Scholar Award
- 2025.05 Doctoral Training and Development Support Fund by The University of Manchester
- 2023.03 Excellent Postgraduate Students’ Award of Zhejiang Province (Top 1%)
- 2022.11 Sophia Yang Scholarship of ZJU, 2021-2022 Academic Year (Top 1%)
- 2022.10 Outstanding Postgraduate Award and “Triple-A” Student (academic records, morality, health) Award of ZJU
- 2020.09 Postgraduate Academic Scholarship of ZJU.
- 2018.09 National “Outstanding Work” Award at National Urban Transportation Innovation Practice Competition.
📖 Educations
- 2024.01 - now, The University of Manchester, UK. PhD. Candidate in Environmental Science
- 2020.09 - 2023.06, Zhejiang University, China. M.Sc. in Urban Planning (GPA: 3.88/4.0, Ranking: 1/31)
- 2015.09 - 2020.06, Southwest Jiaotong University, China. B.Eng. in Urban and Rural Planning
💬 Invited Talks
- 2025.07 the 12th International Conference on Urban Climate (Session S1: Digital Twins, AI/ML, and Open Data Science for Urban Climate), Rotterdam, Netherlands
- 2024.08, NERC’s Digital Gathering 2024, Manchester, UK
- 2022.07, 16th International Association for China Planning (IACP) Annual Conference, Session 7.3: Transit-oriented Development (TOD), Wuhan, China, June 23-27, 2022
💻 Internships
- 2024.03 - now, AI for Earth in Shanghai AI lab, Shanghai, China.
- 2020.06 - 2020.08, Assistant city planner, China Southwest Architectural Design and Research Institute Co., Ltd