Jie Liang, completed a BSc degree in Geographic Science at Sun Yat-Sen University (2014) and then her PhD in Ecology at Tsinghua University (2019) supervised by Professor Guanghui Lin. There she quantified water-carbon processes in coastal mangrove forests using modelling she developed based on gas exchange and water isotopic signatures in a collaboration with Professor Xuhui Lee at Yale University and Professor Leonel Sternberg at University of Miami. From this she determined that water isotope ratios in plant stems were not identical to the source water. This opened up new questions for exploration.

She then took up a post-doctoral position (2019-2021) with Professor Graham Farquhar at the Australian National University (ANU). There she tested and modelled water processes within plant stems using water isotopic data, and determined the origin of the isotopic differences between stem water and source water. Her model is currently being applied to predict plant water status as reflected in the swelling and shrinkage of plant stems, a major research objective in her current post-doctoral position with Professor Marilyn C. Ball (ANU). She is also looking to quantify large scale plant water relations moving from physiological to regional processes. She has now developed a model of the mechanism of plant water use efficiency which will significantly improve our understanding of plant water use strategy and is being refined to include contributions of foliar water uptake to plant water balance and water use efficiency.