Dr Ping Lu is a plant ecophysiologist with over 39 years’ experience in natural forest restoration, tropical horticulture, and mine site ecosystem restoration in Australia, China and France. For the past 30 years he has been providing expert advice in forest ecohydrology, plant ecophysiology, as well as mine closure studies and mine site rehabilitation including terrestrial ecosystem reconstruction and remediation of land contaminated by radioactive waste.
Prior to his retirement in Dec 2022, he had been the Principal Advisor/Manager for Ecological Rehabilitation of the closure team with Rio Tinto ERA’s Ranger Uranium Mine for over 15 years. Before joining Rio Tinto, he was the senior research scientist leading CSIRO research on mango physiology, cultivation and breeding for over 13 years. He has been the Chairperson of the International Society for Horticultural Science’s Mango Working Group since 2015 promoting mango research and development worldwide.
He was a Charles Darwin University Fellow, and an Adjunct Professor of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
- Author of over 100 scientific papers, editor of 2 books, and reviewer for over 30 international scientific journals
- Strategic direction and design of world-class fit-for-purpose solutions to complex mine site ecological rehabilitation
- Provision of strategic, pragmatic technical support and direction to leadership and operational teams
- Experience in leading instrumentation engineering projects, founder of an award-winning business (PlantSensors) in design and manufacture of scientific environmental instrument (Sap flow system).
- Chairperson, ISHS Mango Working Group (2015-present)