Recently, announced by the Asia-Pacific Organizing Committee of Imperial Barrel Award (IBA) organized by the American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG), a postgraduate team from the School of Geosciences at UPC won second place in the Asia-Pacific region, marking the best result among Chinese universities in this year and the best result of UPC since it participated in the event.

Supervised by Professor Zhang Shiqi, with guidance from supervisor Yomi Gaius and Zhang Yaxuan, the team consists of postgraduate students Gao Qianziyi, Zhang Zhaochen, Lyu Shuwen, Wu Ziquan, and Liu Yanxian. They dedicated their efforts in the winter holiday last year during the tight schedule and heavy workload of the competition. Utilizing the geological data provided by the organizers and drawing on their professional expertise and prior competition experience, the team conducted extensive literature reviews, engaged in rigorous discussions, and tackled complex challenges. By doing so, their final project online, titledMerrimelia, Australia-High Potential Exploration Area for Natural Gas, presented a comprehensive analysis of the natural gas exploration potential in Merrimelia, Australia, which received high praise from the judges.

IBA, a global academic contest hosted by AAPG for the postgraduate students, invites master and doctoral teams specializing in geology, geophysics, petroleum engineering, and other related fields worldwide. Participants are required to ultimately evaluate the exploration potential of these blocks by an in-depth analysis of geological datasets from oil and gas field blocks provided by the competition organizing committee.This competition attracts participation from over 80 countries and more than 300 universities worldwide every year.