Dr. LIU Wen-Tso is the chair and professor of Environmental Engineering & Science program at the Department of Civil and Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). He has received PhD degree from University of Tokyo in 1995. His research interests and efforts focus on the microbial ecology and molecular microbiology aspects of water and wastewater treatment processes. This is based on the facts that the microorganisms are the key catalyst for wastewater treatment, and the primary causative agents for the failure of water purification systems and the occurrences of infectious diseases. To better design, improve and optimize treatment processes in the long run, he collaborates with process-based researchers to study water and wastewater treatment processes with emphases on microbial diversity, community structure, function and interaction. Professor Liu has served as a member of the editorial board for several leading journals in Environmental Microbiology (e.g., Applied Environmental Microbiology, Microbial Ecology, and the ISME journal by Nature publisher), and has contributed as a reviewer for more than 15 leading journals.