The institute was founded in 2012 and established by first director Academician Guowei Zhang. The deputy director is Professor Sanzhong Li. It will aim to many national strategic needs and international scientific frontiers. We try to take three-step strategy through more than 30 years of continuous support to establish one international research center of Marine Geodynamics. The first step is to improve the dynamics of the ocean floor around the western Pacific and the Indian Ocean, and to build a surveying and research platform. By carrying out specific research grants try to accumulate and develop disciplines advantage; The second step is to take major national programs and research projects, reaching international visibility of the achievements and leading the international scientific frontiers in the field of the Pacific and Indian oceans; The third step is to find new scientific frontiers in the world's oceans, accumulating a wealth of research, having a huge impact and leading international research development and becoming one of the international research center on dynamics of the ocean floor. In short, the institute constantly aims at the international academic hot debates, mainly to strengthen the study of the Western Pacific Continental Margin at this stage, and to select the Western Pacific Plate Subduction Zone for understanding geological processes and dynamics associated with the effects of disasters, resources, and to strive with significant academic status in the international arena.

Between 2012 to 2022, on the basis of strengthening the pre-existing research in mainland China, the institute focuses on 1) the Western Pacific Subduction Zone and its continental margins, carrying out comprehensive survey and understanding to subduction processes to discuss the effects of different types, different subducting plate angles, subduction depth. It will help to comprehensively understand "subduction factory", "source to sink effect", resources and environmental effects of subduction zone processes and to develop some methods by comparison of continent to ocean and establish one group to frontier areas on continent-ocean transition; 2) to carry out typical geological period, the reconstruction ocean-land pattern in typical areas, and interdisciplinary cooperation with physical oceanography, to explore new multidisciplinary study of marine geology neighborhood; to establish three dimensional exploration and monitoring system from subduction zones to marginal seas, to explore the relationship between continent-ocean transition and transfer, to deepen the development of plate tectonics theory, and to establish a disaster monitoring network for typical segment of continent-ocean coupling hazard, to pioneer ocean-continent transition and to study their coupling hazard disaster chain, to especially carry out landslide-earthquake disaster chain in the northern part of the South China Sea, and earthquake disaster chain in the metropolitan area to Bohai Bay; 3 ) to carry out deepwater oil- and gas-related structural geology and natural gashydrate-related active tectonics in East China Sea and South China Sea. Secondly, the institute is to deepen the study on mid-oceanic ridges, especially Mesozoic tectonic evolution of mid-ocean ridges and kinetic mechanisms of the Northwest Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean, to provide a scientific basis for deep-sea exploration for polymetallic sulphides. Developing some new research tools and research methods is to establish systematic research methods and facilities, developing some characteristic study of domestic ocean ridge and subduction zones and forming the new objectives of the dynamics of the ocean floor.

From the view of kinetics, the dynamic systems on ocean floor can be divided into three dynamic subsystems of mid-oceanic ridges, deep-sea basin and subduction zone. Marine Geodynamics will break the traditional Geology Theory and the Theory of Plate Tectonics under the guidance of scientific thought of the Earth system, integrating Marine Science, Marine Geology, Marine Geochemistry and Marine Geophysical exploration and processing high-techs, relying on numerical simulation technology and focusing on dynamics and processes of mid-oceanic ridge, deep-sea basin and subduction system subsystems, and the transmission, transformation, cycling, exchange and other interactive processes of matter and energy systems between the interface and among the different spheres. Meanwhile under the present-day development trend of geosciences, it will strengthenes and deepens the comparative study of transition and junction relationship between continent and ocean is one important way to deepen the understanding of ocean floor. In short, from the overall solid marine geosciences and multidisciplinary research to ocean-continent transition, the purpose and goal are to explore the origin and evolution of the ocean floor to protect and service a variety of marine activities such as human exploitation of seabed resources, safeguard maritime rights and protection of the marine environment.