About
Lai has long been engaged in interdisciplinary research focusing on human behaviour, population dynamics, environmental changes, and infectious disease transmission and interventions. He has published ~200 book chapters and peer-reviewed papers in scientific journals, including Nature, Science, Lancet Infectious Diseases, Nature Medicine, Nature Human Behaviour, BMJ, and Nature Communications.
Research
Research groups
Research interests
- Lai is interested in understanding the transmission dynamics and intervention effectiveness for infectious diseases; Quantifying seasonal human mobility, social connectivity and migration using novel data sources, e.g. mobile phone data; Investigating spatiotemporal interactions between human behaviour, environmental change and infectious disease dynamics.
Current research
Funded by several national and international funders, as PI/project lead/Co-I in Southampton, his research focuses on spatial demography and spatial epidemiology to model human population dynamics and reveal transmission risk of infectious diseases under environmental changes. Projects in the past five years:
- Machine learning for blue line tracing and wastewater surveillance, Gates Foundation, 2025-2026
- Mapping the risk of Guinea worm disease at a high resolution using geospatial and machine learning approaches, the Carter Centre, 2024-2026
- The fear of 'here': Integrating place-based travel behaviour and detection into novel infectious disease models, National Science Foundation, 2023-2026
- Giving Rural Actors Novel data and re-Useable tools to Lead public Action in Rural area (GRANULAR), Horizon Europe Guarantee (UKRI), 2022-2026
- Human mobility models to forecast disease dynamics and the effectiveness of public health interventions, National Institute for Health (NIH), 2021-2026
- Exploring the seasonality of COVID-19, Gates Foundation, 2021-2022
- MOnitoring Outbreak events for Disease surveillance in a data science context (MOOD), EU Horizon, 2020-2024
- Quantifying Dengue Importation Risk from Southeast Asia and Environmental Suitability of Secondary Transmission in China, National Natural Science Foundation of China, 2018-2021
Research projects
Active projects
Researchers:
Completed projects
Researchers:
Sponsor: Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Publications
175 publications
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H Juliette T Unwin, Isobel Routledge, Seth Flaxman, Marian-Andrei Rizoiu, Shengjie Lai, Justin Cohen, Daniel J Weiss, Swapnil Mishra & Samir Bhatt,
2021, PLoS Computational Biology, 17(4), e1008830
Type: article
Bing Xu, Jinfeng Wang, Zhongjie Li, Chengdong Xu, Yilan Liao, Maogui Hu, Jing Yang, Shengjie Lai, Liping Wang & Weizhong Yang,
2021, The Lancet Planetary Health, 5(3), e154-e163
Type: article
Philippe Lemey, Nick Ruktanonchai, Samuel Hong, Vittoria Colizza, Chiara Poletto, Frederik Van den Broeck, Mandev Gill, Xiang Ji, Anthony Levasseur, Adam Sadilek, Shengjie Lai, Andrew Tatem, Guy Baele, Marc Suchard & Simon Dellicour,
2021
Type: other
Shengjie Lai, Qiulan Chen & Zhongjie Li,
2021, China CDC Weekly, 3(6), 120-123
Type: letterEditorial
Jing Yang, Juan Li, Shengjie Lai, Corrine W. Ruktanonchai, Weijia Xing, Alessandra Carioli, Peihan Wang, Nick W. Ruktanonchai, Ruiyun Li, Jessica R. Floyd, Liang Wang, Yuhai Bi, Weifeng Shi & Andrew J. Tatem,
2020, Journal of Travel Medicine, 27(8)
DOI: 10.1093/jtm/taaa200
Type: article
Xinhua Chen, Wei Wang, Yan Wang, Shengjie Lai, Juan Yang, Benjamin J Cowling, Peter W Horby, Timothy M Uyeki & Hongjie Yu,
2020, BMC Medicine, 18(1)
Type: article
Hualei Xin, Peng Fu, Junling Sun, Shengjie Lai, Wenbiao Hu, Archie C A Clements, Jianping Sun, Jing Cui, Simon I Hay, Xiaojing Li & Zhongjie Li,
2020, PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases, 14(12)
Type: article
W Z Yang, Y J Lan, W Lyu, Z W Leng, L Z Feng, S J Lai, C C Ye & Q Wang,
2020, Zhonghua liu xing bing xue za zhi = Zhonghua liuxingbingxue zazhi, 41, 1753-1757
Type: article
Wei Wang, Xinhua Chen, Yan Wang, Shengjie Lai, Juan Yang, Benjamin J Cowling, Peter W Horby, Timothy M Uyeki & Hongjie Yu,
2020, The Journal of Infectious Diseases
Type: article
Juan Yang, Xinhua Chen, Xiaowei Deng, Zhiyuan Chen, Hui Gong, Han Yan, Qianhui Wu, Huilin Shi, Shengjie Lai, Marco Ajelli, Cecile Viboud & Hongjie Yu,
2020, Nature Communications, 11(1)
Type: article
External roles and responsibilities
Name:
Frontiers in Epidemiology (Journal)
Role:
Member of editorial board
Year:
2021
Name:
International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation (Journal)
Role:
Editor
Year:
2021 - 2022
Name:
Infectious Diseases of Poverty (Journal)
Role:
Member of editorial board
Year:
2021 - 2025
Name:
Mobility modelling for displacement, migration and COVID-19 using mobile phone data
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2022
Name:
Presentation for the Session: Migration in the Context of the COVID-19 Pandemic
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Using phylogeographical model and mobility data to understand the spread of variants in COVID-19 resurgence, in the session of Environment and Health Research
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Presenting in the session of GIScience-Informed Evaluations of COVID-19 Policy Responses
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Infectious Diseases of Poverty journal - 4th online webinar (IDEA Forum)
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Invited presentation in the session of Tropical Disease Situation in GMS and the Impact of COVID-19
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
Assessing the effects of travel and contact reductions to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic and resurgence
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
External examiner to examine a PhD thesis
Role:
Examiner
Year:
2020
Name:
Invited presentation for the Session: Big Data and Epidemics Response
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
Invited presentation in the Session: Data innovation for early warning and understanding of displacement and internal mobility
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2020
Name:
Invited talk in the Session of Ecosystem change, climate-sensitive disease, early warning and climate services
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Oral and poster presentations of international travel, internal migration and disease transmission
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Invited talk of the impact of seasonal population movements on mosquito-borne diseases transmission.
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Presenting how population movement could be estimated to help in determining the denominator at different administrative levels
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Presenting how to use mobile phone data for measuring internal migration
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Invited talk of The use of mobile phone data for tourism and migration statistics
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Invited presentation of exploring the use of mobile phone data for national migration statistics
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2019
Name:
Presentation of mapping population and mosquito-borne disease connectivity
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2018
Name:
Field trip of malaria surveillance and invited presentation of mapping human movements and malaria connectivity
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2018
Name:
Presenting the methodology for estimating importation and onward transmission risks of mosquito-borne diseases via air travellers
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2018
Name:
Invited talk of Modelling the spreading risk and intervention effectiveness for infectious diseases
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2022
Name:
Invited talk on Measuring human mobility, COVID-19 spread risk and intervention effectiveness
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Name:
Invited talk of Measuring human mobility, COVID-19 spread risk and intervention effectiveness
Role:
Speaker
Year:
2021
Biography
Prizes
- 2021 Vice-Chancellor's Awards - Early Career (2021)
- Dean’s Prize for Research (2019)
- Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed (non-government sponsored) Students Abroad (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 3rd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2022 Science and Technology Progress Award, Ministry of Education of P.R. China (2023)
- 2021 Vice-Chancellor's Awards - Early Career (2021)
- Dean’s Prize for Research (2019)
- Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed (non-government sponsored) Students Abroad (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 3rd prize of 2016 Medical Science and Technology Award of China (2017)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2016 Science and Technology Progress Award of Beijing (2016)
- 2nd prize of 2022 Science and Technology Progress Award, Ministry of Education of P.R. China (2023)