Montpellier Advanced Knowledge Institute on Transitions

Chih-Hao Hsieh

Chih-Hao (Zac) Hsieh is a Professor of Oceanography at National Taiwan University. His fellowship at the Montpellier Advanced Knowledge Institute on Transitions ran from 1 September 2023 to 31 December 2023.

Biography:

Chih-Hao (Zac) Hsieh is a Professor of Oceanography with a joint appointment at the the Institute of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at National Taiwan University. He served as Director of the Institute of Oceanography from August 2020 to July 2023.

Chih-Hao Hsieh’s academic journey began with an MS/BA in Zoology from National Taiwan University, followed by a PhD in Oceanography from the University of California-San Diego. Since joining the faculty of National Taiwan University in 2007, he has played a major role in research and teaching.

His notable achievements include receiving the Biwako Prize for Ecology, the Ministry of Science and Technology Outstanding Research Award of Taiwan, recognition as one of the Ten Outstanding Young Persons of Taiwan, and the Young Scientist Research Innovation Award.

Chih-Hao Hsieh’s research prowess is evidenced by his authorship of over 130 research articles, many of which have been published in prestigious journals such as Nature and Science. His research focuses on developing robust methods for time series analysis in dynamical systems, with applications in environmental management, economics, epidemiology, ecology, medical sciences and neural sciences.

Research interests :

  • Zooplankton Ecology;
  • Interaction network;
  • Ecosystem stability;
  • Dynamical system;
  • Time series analysis

Project: Deciphering time-varying interaction networks using time series observations and empirical dynamic modeling to investigate community dynamics and stability

During my fellowship in Montpellier, I compiled fish community time series data in different regions at the global scale. My objective is to construct time-varying interaction networks for each region. Then, I aim to investigate how the environmental changes and policy intervention have affected the network properties, and how the network properties subsequently affect ecosystem stability and functioning, such as fish production.

Why a fellowship in Montpellier?

I come to Montpellier to conduct my research project with my two hosts here: Vasilis Dakos at the Institute of Evolutionary Science of Montpellier (ISEM) and Juan-Carlos Molinero in MARBEC.


I am free from administrative duties, and have more time to concentrate on research. Through interaction with MAK’IT fellows, I came to appreciate more the social component of my research, which leads me to develop the research idea of “Coupled social-economic-ecological complex feedback system”.

Recent publications on Zac’s SCOPUS profile include:

  • Chang, C., Miki, T., Masayuki Ushio, Ke, P., Lu, H., Shiah, F. and Hsieh, C. (2021). Reconstructing large interaction networks from empirical time series data. Ecology Letters, 24(12), pp.2763–2774. doi:https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.13897.
  • Florian Grziwotz, Chang, C., Vasilis Dakos, Nes, van, Schwarzländer, M., Kamps, O., Heßler, M., Tokuda, I.T., Telschow, A. and Hsieh, C. (2023). Anticipating the occurrence and type of critical transitions. Science Advances, 9(1). doi:https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abq4558.