Updated on June 26, 2025
Welcome toVRockLab website!
I am Wei-Ran (aka Alex) Li 李蔚然, the PI of the VRock Laboratory and assistant professor (tenure-track) in Volcanology and Igneous Petrology at the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Hong Kong. I also work as the chief curator of Stephen Hui Geological Museum (the only 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: Dr. Oliver Shorttle and Prof. John Maclennan) before joining HKU as a faculty member.
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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
My research areas include Merapi volcano (Indonesia), Mount Erebus (Antarctica), Changbaishan volcano (China), and Mayon volcano (Philippines).
Since 2014, I have been working on effusive-explosive eruption transition at active volcanoes and have developed multiple models/calculation tools based on a volatile-bearing phosphate mineral - apatite (see research projects and models/tools pages). I am particularly interested in applying thermodynamic modelling to study mineral-fluid-melt systems, including volatile/rare-earth element partitioning, mineral-based thermobarometry, and mantle temperatures.
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Teaching:
2023/2024:
Mineralogy (Semester 1);
Igneous and Metamorphic Petrology (Semester 2)
Geochemistry (Semester 2)
2022/2023:
Fundamentals of Modern Sciences (Semester 2)
Data Analysis (Semester 2)
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Please do not hesitate to contact me (weiranli AT hku.hk) if you are interested in collaborating or joining our group (see VACANCIES page).
News
2025
June/July
I will attend IAVCEI in Geneva (giving 1 talk and 1 poster on the morning and evening of Thursday, 3 July) and Goldschmidt in Prague (organising early-career workshop on the afternoon of Sunday, 6 July).
April
Convened a session on volatiles and fluids at the Chinese Society for Mineralogy Petrology and Geochemistry 19th annual meeting in Wuhan. An amazing conference!
Check out two papers we published this month in National Science Review (NSR) and Journal of Petrology where we applied diffusion chronometry to study the thermal history of magmatic systems and ocean island basalt-mantle temperatures:
NSR: Li and Costa (2025)
https://doi.org/10.1093/nsr/nwaf141
J Petrol: Li et al (2025)
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 developed in our previous work. New calculation tools will be provided on the above website in future.
2024
December
Check out our session ("Low-probability high-impact eruptions") at IAVCEI2025! Abstract submission is open till December 20, 2024.
November
I have joined the Editorial Board of Volcanica as a Topical Editor.
July-August
A very busy and productive summer! Check out our new paper published in CMP about global magmatic apatite volatile systematics: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00410-024-02147-8
June
I gave a talk on apatite analysis at the EPMA forum at Zhejiang University (Hangzhou, China) on 15 June. Amazing conference and campus of ZJU!
May
I gave an invited talk at the 9th Young Scientist Forum of Earth Sciences in Xiamen on 19 May.
March
Led 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 DES, HKU (check out the "facilities" page for more info).
2023
October
Our new Zeiss microscope has been installed in our laboratory (see more from the "facilities" page).
September
Gave invited talks at the Hutton-X granite conference in Baveno, Italy (Sep 10-15), and the Geological Society of China Annual Meeting (中国地质学会2023学术年会) in Hainan, China (Sep 19-21).
July-August
The Goldschmidt and AOGS sessions we convened went super well. Thank you to all co-convenors and speakers!!
April
Gave a science talk at the Singapore International School (Hong Kong). Glad to find out that the local students know a lot about geohazards!
February
I'm convening two conference sessions this summer: AOGS SE08 and Goldschmidt 5e. Abstract submission deadlines are approaching!
January
We have a new paper published in CMP about magma volatile story of Erebus volcano, Antarctica and a generalised apatite-melt REE partitioning model: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00410-022-01985-8
2022
September
I moved to University of Hong Kong as an assistant professor and museum curator.
May
Check out our new paper in Geology about the cause of an explosive-effusive-explosive eruption transition at Rabaul volcano, Papua New Guinea, with insights from apatite
https://doi.org/10.1130/G50023.1
Febuary-March
I gave invited talks (in Chinese) for Northwest University, Xian (西北大学), and the Bochum diffusion seminar series. See recorded videos on "PRESENTATIONS" page.