Dr. Chung-Chien Young was one of China's foremost paleontologists. He has been called the 'Father of Chinese vertebrate paleontology'. He was born in Huaxian, Shaanxi province.Yang graduated from the Geological department of Beijing University in 1923 and in 1927 received his doctorate at Munich University in Germany. In 1928 he worked for the Cenozoic Research Laboratory of the Geological Survey of China and took charge of the excavation at Peking Man Site in Zhoukoudian.

Dr. Pei Wenzhong was a Chinese paleontologist, archaeologist and anthropologist. Professor Pei is considered the founding father of Chinese anthropology.He graduated from the Peking University in 1928 and went to work for the Cenozoic Research Laboratory of the Geological Survey of China joining the excavations of Peking Man Site in Zhoukoudian, where he was named the field director of the excavations in the following year.

Dr. Chow Minchen was born in Shanghai, China, and graduated from Chongqing University in 1943. He received a MSc degree from the University of Miami in 1948 and a Ph.D. degree from Lehigh University in 1950. He became an associate professor at Shandong University and in 1952 joined the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing where he remained until 1996.

Professor Jia Lanpo was one of China's leading archaeologists and a director of the Peking man excavation. Professor Jia was one of the founders of Chinese anthropology.He graduated from the Huiwen High School of Beijing in 1929 and went on to work as a trainee at the Cenozoic Research Laboratory of the Geological Survey of China. In April 1931 he joined the excavation at Peking Man in Zhoukoudian where he worked with many of the biggest names in anthropology of his era, including Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Henri Breuil, Davidson Black, Franz Weidenreich and Pei Wenzhong whom he replaced as the head of Zhoukoudian excavations in 1935.

Dr. Woo Jukang was born in Wujing, Jiangshu Province, and graduated from Nanjing University in 1940. He received a master's degree from Washington University in St. Louis USA in 1947. Two years later, he obtained a doctor's degree from the same university.

Professor Xinzhi WU, member of Chinese Academy of Science, and honorary president of Chinese Society for Anatomical Sciences, was born in Hefei City, Anhui Province in June of 1928. He graduated from Shanghai Medical College in 1953. From 1952 to 1953, he was in an advanced training program for teachers of human anatomy sponsored by the Ministry of Health of Chinese Central Government. He finished post-graduate study in paleoanthropology in Chinese Academy of Science in 1961.

Dr. Meemann Chang, former director of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP) in Beijing. Her work has helped clarify the links between the fish that swam in Earth's oceans 400 million years ago and the air-breathing, land-walking creatures that evolved from them. She has played a key role for years in bringing little-known Chinese fish fossils to the attention of the scientific world.

Dr. Zhangxiang Qiu, born in Qingdao City of Shandong Province, is a paleomammologist and Cenozoic stratigrapher. He is the fifth director of the IVPP (1991-1995). He graduated from the Department of Geology at the Lomonosov Moscow State University in 1960, and received his Ph. D. from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz in Germany. Qiu joined the IVPP in 1960, and is promoted from an assistant professor, associate professor to a full professor there.

Dr. Zhonghe Zhou,born in Jiangdu, Jiangshu Province, is a paleo-ornothologist, and the nineth and tenth director of the IVPP (2008-). He graduated from the Department of Geology of Nanjing University in 1986, and after getting his Ph. D. from the University of Kansas in USA in 1999, he returned to IVPP as the first awardee of 100 Talents Programme of the Chinese Academy of Sciences at IVPP.

Dr. Zhu Min, born in Zhangjiagang, Jiangsu Province, is a CPC member and a paleoichthyologist. He received his Ph.D. from the IVPP in 1990. He specializes in early vertebrates and evolutionary biology. As a global leader in early vertebrate evolution, Zhu has proposed new hypotheses and provided key empirical evidence on theoretical issues including the origin of the vertebrate jaws, the origin and early differentiation pattern of gnathostomes, and the origin and early evolution of Osteichthyes.

Dr. Xu Xing, born in Xinyuan, Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (2023), paleontologist and evolutionary biologist. He received his B.S. degree in Geology from Peking University in 1992, and he received his Ph.D. from the IVPP in 2002. From 2003 to 2005, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the American Museum of Natural History. He is now a researcher and doctoral supervisor of the Institute.