Peiying Hong, associate professor of environmental science and engineering
After graduating from the National University of Singapore with a PhD in environmental sciences and engineering, Professor Peiying Hong went on to complete her postdoctoral training at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). It was there that she became aware of the opportunities at KAUST, with UIUC serving as an academic excellence alliance partner.
Hong’s research interests centre on wastewater ecosystems and how water scarcity can be better addressed in the Middle East. Her work aims to promote high-quality treated wastewater as an alternative water source in the region, focusing on safety issues around wastewater treatment and related sustainability challenges. The first pillar of her research looks specifically at microbial contaminants and how these can be removed, while the second explores whether there is an energy-neutral (or perhaps even energy-positive) way of treating wastewater.
Exploring her ambitions for the future, Hong hopes that over the next five years, water reuse will become widespread throughout the Middle East, with 100 per cent of wastewater captured, processed and reused. Her 10-year goal is that there will be enough data to say definitively that wastewater is safe to reuse and that alternative processes are found to clean the wastewater without using any energy at all.
Aside from that, Hong continues to appreciate the freedom provided by her role at KAUST, enjoying research that she finds interesting and is also truly impactful. Outside academia, she remains committed to her other passion: a trap-neuter-release programme at KAUST to help maintain a sustainable stray cat population.
Find out more about Peiying Hong's research at KAUST.
