Meet Our Distinguished Scholars

 

Prof. Xiaoming Tao (PhD) is the Vincent and Lily Woo Professor in Textile Technology and the founding director of the Research Institute for Intelligent Wearable Systems, an interdisciplinary unit at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She is an elected Fellow of the European Academy of Nature Sciences, Hong Kong Academy of Engineering, American Society of Mechanical Engineering and Textile Institute International. Prof. Tao is the former World President of the Textile International. Prof. Tao is a leading scientist in intelligent wearables based on fibrous materials and structures, and has conducted numerous interdisciplinary research projects with medical and health professionals. Among her over 1,000 published research works are seven edited monographs, 460 peer reviewed SCI journal papers, numerous exhibitions and invited plenary/keynote speeches at international conferences. Her work has been published in leading journals including Nature, Nature Sustainability, Nature Electronics, Nature Communications and Advanced Materials, with more than 36,000 citations and an H-index of 97. She is the recipient of more than 50 prestigious research awards, including the Guanghua Engineering Scientific and Technology Award from the Chinese Academy of Engineering; Founder’s Award from the Fiber Society, USA, the highest international individual award offered by the Society; and Honorary Fellow, at Textile Institute International, the highest international individual award offered by the Institute. 

As PI or PC, Prof. Tao has received total competitive research funding of more than HK$380M for more than 80 projects. Hong Kong funding includes RGC TRS (2025/HK$62.4M), Innovation and Technology Fund (2025/HK$10M, 2024/HK$7.8M, 2018/HK$7.2M and 2004/HK$10M), Sports Science and technology Fund (2023/HK$8.4M), and NSFC/RGC collaborative Fund (2004/HK$4.4M).

Scientific and technological breakthroughs generated from her research group have been applied by industry worldwide. Her inventions in energy-saving and eco-friendly yarn production have been licensed to and adopted by more than twenty companies worldwide, including the world’s largest core yarn manufacturer and leading brands. The discovery and technology development of anti-microbial biopolymer oligomers have resulted in mass production and marketing of the products by six companies. In total, nine technology companies have been spun off from her group in the fields of new materials, new production technology and wearable devices.