Updated on August 21, 2025
Welcome toVRock Laboratory website!
My name is Wei-Ran ("Alex") Li 李蔚然. I am the founder of VRock Laboratory and currently work as an assistant professor (tenure-track) in Volcanology and Igneous Petrology at the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at the University of Hong Kong. I am also the chief curator of Stephen Hui Geological Museum (the first geological museum in Hong Kong).
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I studied at Peking University (Beijing) for my B.S. (in Geochemistry & double major in art history; 2008-2012) and M.S. (in Structural Geology; 2012-2014), and completed my PhD on subduction-zone volcanism at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore in 2019 (supervisor: Prof. Fidel Costa). I visited Ruhr University Bochum, Germany as a PhD student in 2017 to conduct diffusion experiments (supervisor: Prof. Sumit Chakraborty). I was a postdoc at University of Cambridge between 2021-2022 (supervisors: Prof. Oliver Shorttle and Prof. John Maclennan) before joining HKU as a faculty member in 2022. Since 2023, I have been the PI of seven research projects (four external; three internal) with a total funding exceeding $3 million HKD (>320,000 EURO and >380,000 USD).
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Research topics: I use a combination of petrological observations, in-situ microanalyses, thermodynamic and kinetic modelling, and high-temperature experiments to study:
(1) volcanoes: volcanic eruption mechanisms / magma storage and mixing / volcanic hazards
(2) volatiles (H2O-CO2-S-F-Cl) cycling at subduction zones
(3) timescales of magmatic processes (diffusion chronometry) and geological events (Ar-Ar and U-Th dating)
(4) mantle chemistry and temperature
(5) Rare earth element partitioning and ore generation
Research areas & field work: I have been intensively working on the effusive-explosive transition of Quaternary volcanoes in East and Southeast Asia, such as:
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Toba and other large calderas in Sumatra, Indonesia (ongoing)
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Pinatubo, Phillippines (ongoing)
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Taal, Phillippines (ongoing)
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Changbaishan, China (ongoing & M.S. thesis)
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Rabaul, Papua New Guinea (ongoing)
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Merapi, Java, Indonesia (PhD thesis)
Computer simulation: I specialise in developing and applying integrated thermodynamic-diffusion models for studies on mineral-fluid-melt systems. I have developed multiple calculation tools based on a volatile-bearing phosphate mineral - apatite (see research projects and models/tools pages) to trace magma chemistry variability and the time-rates of magmatism.
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Teaching:
Mineralogy (2023-present; semester 1);
Geochemistry (2024-present; semester 2);
Igneous and Metamorphic Petrology (2023/2024)
Fundamentals of Modern Sciences (2022/2023)
Data Analysis (2022/2023)
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Do not hesitate to contact me (weiranli AT hku.hk) if you are interested in collaborating with us or joining our group as a postdoc/postgraduate student (see VACANCIES page)!
News
Please note that all the apatite-based calculation tools we developed have been migrated to our lab's new website: http://vrocklab.hku.hk
2025
Upcoming:
I will join the Geochemical News Editorial Committee in January 2026.
In November 2025, I will give a keynote invited talk at the Australian Specialist Group in Geochemistry, Mineralogy & Petrology (SGGMP) biennial conference (https://sggmp25.com/). Excited to visit Australia for the second time of the year!
In September 2025, I will lead the HKU team to attend the 8th ACV field camp in Shimabara, Japan. This will be the third time for junior researchers from HK to participate in the field camp after Bali, Indonesia and Jeju, Korea.
August: I am honoured to join two scientific committees （专委会）about "Mantle geochemistry" and "Volcanology and Chemistry of the Earth's Interior" of the prestigious Chinese Society for Mineralogy, Petrology and Geochemistry (中国矿物岩石地球化学学会). I will serve in the two positions for four years.
Two co-author papers became online this month. Check out the collaborative work by colleagues from HK and USA in Science Advances about submarine lava flow emplacement and seismicity: https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adk3942
June & July: attended IAVCEI conference in Geneva (gave 1 talk and 1 poster presentation; co-convened 1 session), and Goldschmidt conference in Prague (organised a grant writing workshop for early career researchers and received very positive feedback from the participants!). Great to see old friends and colleagues and form new collaborations.
April: Convened a session on volatiles and fluids at the Chinese Society for Mineralogy Petrology and Geochemistry annual meeting in Wuhan. An amazing conference and lots of great talks!
Published two first-author papers this month in National Science Review (NSR) and Journal of Petrology, where we investigated the uses of diffusion chronometry to study the thermal history of magma bodies and the compositional variability of olivines from ocean island basalts for mantle temperature estimation.
NSR: https://doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwaf141
J Petrol: https://doi.org/10.1093/petrology/egaf033
February: Check out our new website for the VRockLab (http://vrocklab.hku.hk) compiling all apatite-based calculation tools we have developed. New calculation tools will be released on this website in the near future. Stay tuned!
2024
December: Check out our session ("Low-probability high-impact eruptions") at IAVCEI2025! Abstract submission open till December 20, 2024.
November: I joined the Editorial Board of Volcanica as a Topical Editor.
July-August: published a first-author paper in CMP about global magmatic apatite volatile systematics: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00410-024-02147-8
June: gave a talk about analysis of apatite chemistry at the microanalysis forum at Zhejiang University (Hangzhou); had an amazing conference and good time!
May: honoured to give an invited talk at the 9th Young Scientist Forum of Earth Sciences in Xiamen.
March: Led the VRockLab group members to attend ACV field camp in Bali, Indonesia (first time for HKUers to participate) and (re)visited Batur and Agung volcanoes!
January: Start to be the PI of the electron microprobe (EPMA) laboratory at HKU (check out the "facilities" page for more info).