ZHU Zhaoliang is a famous expert in soil-plant nutrition and one of the pioneers and leading scientists in soil nitrogen transformation and nitrogen management for crop production in China. He studied soil nitrogen supplying capacity and supplying pattern of paddy field in Suzhou and differentiated the supplying capacity into soil-origin and nonsoil-origin, elucidated the reason of increased demand for nitrogen fertilizer application rate of rice in rice–rice–wheat cropping system compared with that in rice-wheat cropping system in the Taihu Lake region, and proposed an approach in recommending the optimal application rate of nitrogen fertilizer, i.e., ‘regional control in combination with tuning according to the specific field conditions’ based on the regional mean optimal application rate of nitrogen fertilizer. He quantitatively studied the fate of nitrogen fertilizer in situ in the field, and for the first time, estimated the utilization efficiency of nitrogen fertilizer by crop plants in China and the total loss, as well as the losses via different pathways in the field. He actively promoted the development of the disciplines, organized the compilation of Nitrogen in Soils of China and other monographs. He established the long-term field experiment of chemical fertilizer in The State Experimental Station of Agro-Ecosystem in Fengqiu as a research platform for relevant studies. He actively participated and promoted international academic exchange activities. In addition, he focused on exploring ways to remediate the non-point source pollution in China and to solve the food security issues.