过程监控及故障诊断; 智能信号处理(工程、医学)； 控制系统性能分析； 智能控制及应用, 复杂机电系统仿真分析。

目前承担教育部留学回国人员科研启动基金项目, “十一五”国家科技支撑计划重点项目子课题等。现已发表论文30余篇，其中SCI检索4篇次， EI 检索15篇次。最近发表的部分重要论文如下：
1.XIA CM., ZHENG JR. and HOWELL J.(2007). “Isolation of Whole-plant Multiple Oscillations via Non-negative Spectral Decomposition”, Chinese Journal of Chemical Engineering, 15(3): 353-360. (SCI, EI)
2.Xia, CM. & Howell, J., Thornhill, N. F. (2005) "Detecting & Isolating Multiple Plant-Wide Oscillations Via Spectral Independent Component Analysis", Automatica, 41(12): 2067-2075 (SCI, EI)
3.Xia, CM. & Howell, J.(2005), "Isolating Multiple Sources of Plant-Wide Oscillations Via Independent Component Analysis", Control Engineering Practice , 13(8): 1027-1035. (SCI, EI)
4.Xia, CM. & Howell, J. (2003). “Loop Status Monitoring and Fault Localisation”, Journal of Process Control, 13(7): 679-691. (SCI, EI)