Research Interest: Low-altitude air mobility and logistics, Transportation and logistics
Education
B.Eng, Port, Waterway, and Coastal Engineering, Ocean University of China, 2015.09-2019.06
M.Eng, Port, Coastal, and Offshore Engineering, Dalian University of Technology, 2019.09-2022.06
Ph.D, Aviation Engineering, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, 2022.09-2025.10
International Visit
Visiting Doctoral Researcher, HEC Montreal, 2024.08-2025.01 (Supervisor: Prof. Okan Arslan)
Signature research outcomes
Core Research
Research 1: Drone-supported relief facility location problem under demand uncertainty.
The studies address the emergency facility location problem for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in post-disaster relief operations. Considering the high uncertainty in demand and supply availability, we formulate a two-stage distributed robust optimization model and a multi-stage stochastic programming model to jointly optimize facility placement, inventory prepositioning, and relief distribution decisions.
Main contributions of Research 1:
1) Propose a distributionally robust optimization framework for UAV facility location that captures demand uncertainty without requiring exact probability distributions.
2) Develop a multi-stage stochastic programming model with recourse actions, enabling sequential decision-making as disaster information gradually unfolds.
3) Design an efficient solution algorithm that integrates the Benders decomposition technique, achieving optimal solutions within acceptable computation time for large-scale instances.
Key Publications
Journal Paper
[1] Jin, Z., Zhang, C., Ng, K. K.*, Tian, X., Wang, H., Xu, G. (2026). Humanitarian logistics planning under uncertain demand and third-party supply capacity: A distributionally robust optimisation approach. International Journal of Production Research, 1-27
[2] Jin, Z., Ng, K. K., Zhang, C.*, Chan, Y., Qin, Y. (2025). A multistage stochastic programming approach for drone-supported humanitarian last-mile logistics system planning. Advanced Engineering Informatics, 65, 103201.
[3] Jin, Z., Ng, K. K., Wang, H.*, Wang, S., Zhang, C. (2025). Electric airport ferry vehicle scheduling problem for sustainable operation. Journal of Air Transport Management, 123, 102711.
[4] Wang, H., Wang, W., Jin, Z.* (2024). Mechanism for allocating delay to constituent activities in project management. Computer & Industrial Engineering, 110603.
[5] Jin, Z., Ng, K. K.*, Zhang, C., Liu, W., Zhang, F., Xu, G. (2024). A risk-averse distributionally robust optimisation approach for drone-supported relief facility location problem. Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, 186, 103538.
[6] Jin, Z., Ng, K. K.*, Zhang, C., Wu, L., Li, A. (2024). Integrated optimisation of strategic planning and service operations for urban air mobility systems. Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 183, 104059.
[7] Jin, Z., Ng, K. K.*, Zhang, C. (2024). Robust optimisation for vertiport location problem considering travel mode choice behaviour in urban air mobility systems. Journal of the Air Transport Research Society, 2, 100006.
Conference Paper
[1] The 17th International Workshop on Computational Transportation Science (CTS 2026), August 2026, Changsha,China.
[2] The 10th International Symposium on Transport Network Resilience (INSTR 2026), July 2026, Lyon, France.
[3] The 29th Air Transport Research Society (ATRS) World Conference, July 2026, Beijing, China.
[4] The 4th International Conference on Urban Informatics (ICUI 2025), August 2025, Hong Kong SAR, China.
[5] The 16th International Workshop on Computational Transportation Science (CTS 2025), July 2025, Wuhan, China.
[6] The 28th Air Transport Research Society (ATRS) World Conference, July 2025, Hong Kong SAR, China.
[7] AIAA AVIATION Forum 2024, July 2024, Las Vegas, USA.
[8] The 26th Air Transport Research Society (ATRS) World Conference, July 2023, Kobe, Japan.
Awards
[1] GERAD Postdoctoral Fellowship Competition 2026-2027, March 2026, Québec, Canada.
[2] Best paper award 2025 from the Journal of the Air Transport Research Society, July 2025, Hong Kong SAR, China.