Assoc Prof He Jie has been with the National Institute of Education (NIE), NTU since 1994. She received her BSc from South China Normal University (1982), MSc from South China Institute of Botany, Academia Sinica, China (1985), PhD from Macquarie University, Australia (1991) and PGDipTHE form NTU, Singapore (1996). While studying as a PhD student (1987-1990) and working as a postdoctoral fellow (1990-1991) in Australia ans as a research fellow in NUS (1992-1994), Dr He Jie had been actively involved in the research on environmental stresses (light, UV-B radiation and temperature) on photosynthesis.

Dr He Jie has successfully applied 22 research grants since she joined NIE. She has been working on the photosynthetic characteristics of high value vegetables grown aeroponically by manipulating rootzone (RZ)-temperature and RZ-CO₂. Her research team has used novel aeroponic technology to produce not only tropical, but also sub-tropical and temperate fresh vegetables all year round by simply cooling the plant roots while the aerial parts grown under tropical ambient environments. She was awarded “Innovation of the Year Award 2001, Singapore” on “A tropical process for growing temperate plants in the tropics”. In 2012, she received the Singapore Millennium Foundation grant to work on “Integrated Vertical Aeroponic Farming System: Towards Food Security and Sustainability in Singapore”. She has won the inaugural NIE Excellence in Research Award 2016 based on her outstanding contributions in extending the frontiers of research and knowledge on vertical farming of vegetable crops under LED lighting. She has just completed a project titled “Physiological and nutritional studies of halophyte vegetables grown under saline condition with LED lighting” supported by the Ministry of Education, Singapore. Her current on-going project is “Microclimate control to increase yield and nutrients of leaf greens at lower energy requirements” in collaboration with MEOD Pte. Ltd supported by Singapore Food Agency. Dr He Jie is also collaborating with Dr Tim W. Yam in NParks on orchid conservation. She is studying the impacts of high temperature and drought on native tropical orchids; and physiology of orchid pseudobulbs. Arising from the above research projects, Dr He Jie has published in top plant science journals such as Environmental and Experimental Botany, Frontiers in Plant Science, Functional Plant Biology, Journal of Experimental Botany, Photosynthesis Research, PLOS ONE.

Dr He Jie has just been awarded two new projects as a co-PI. The first one is “Advanced moisture sensing technology for urban greenery and monitoring of slope stability” supported by the Ministry of National Development, Singapore. Her roles for this project are: i) to investigate the correction between soil and plant water status during drought stress and re-watering; ii) to establish the correlation between soil status and plant health during drought and re-watering; 3) to establish the correction among soil mineral availability, plant mineral nutrition and plant health and 4) to study the mechanism(s) responsible for drought tolerance. Her newly awarded 2nd project (to be started in January 2022) is “Israel-Singapore Urban Farm (iSURF): Data-Intensive Autonomous Intelligent Urban Farming For Whole-Plant Yield Optimization” supported by National Research Foundation, Singapore. As one of the co-PIs, Dr He Jie’s involvement for this project is to induced stress for optimization of nutritional values and taste.