AWARDEE OF EARTH SCIENCES PRIZE
XU HOUZE
Xu Houze, Geodesist and Geophysicist. Born in Anhui in May l934. Graduated from Shanghai Tongji University in l955 and finished the graduate studies in Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics, Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1962. He is now the research professor in Institute of Geodesy and Geophysics, CAS and elected the academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1991. Xus main research fields are geodesy, earth gravity and earth tides. He was the main designer for the establishment of the national fundamental gravity network. In this respect, he worked out a scheme of double-pole plate system for the computation of astro-gravimetric leveling, put forward the processing and upward continuation scheme of mean gravity anomalies, firstly gave a geopotential model in our country. He was devoted to the research concerning the approximation theory of earth gravity field, developed the unified approximation of height anomaly and vertical deflection with constrain condition and the estimation of truncationerror,investigated the representation method of gravity field on and outside of the earth by fictitious single-layer densities，and the simulation of geoid.
As the former president of International Earth Tides Commission, he set up the tidal gravity datum in the mainland of China, studied the tidal deformation under the action of oceanic loading and its accuracy estimation, expanded the earth tides theory to take the mantel lateral heterogeneity into consideration. In the mean time, he proposed and joined the “Global geodynamic plan by use of superconducting gravimeter measurement” together with the international colleagues.
Recently, he is working at space geodesy,including the satellite altimetry and satellite gravity.
