Dr. Li Tan has long been engaged in research on Intelligent Manufacturing, Cloud Manufacturing, Industrial Internet, and Industrial Metaverse. He was the first in the world to propose major technical concepts such as "Cloud Manufacturing" and "Industrial Metaverse," and participated in drafting the national strategy "Made in China 2025." He led the development of China's first intelligent manufacturing cloud platform — Aerospace Cloud Network, and the first commercial C2M new manufacturing platform — Taofactory. He has successively undertaken five national-level research projects including key R&D programs, with cumulative research funding exceeding 20 million RMB. He has published over 30 papers indexed in EI/SCI and highly cited papers, and has been granted more than 10 authorized patents.

His academic publications include the paper "Cloud Manufacturing System 3.0 — A New Intelligent Manufacturing System in the 'Intelligence+' Era," published in the Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing Systems, Volume 25, Issue 12, pp. 2997–3010, which is a highly cited paper on CNKI over the past decade with over 760 citations. He has filed an invention patent application for "A Real-Time Production Line Control Method and Device Based on Digital Twin Models," which has been granted as National Invention Patent ZL 202010947121.2. He has also published a monograph entitled "Accelerating the Implementation of the Industrial Metaverse in Manufacturing and Promoting the Integrated Development of Digital and Real Economies in Smart Hubei," featured in the Academician Think Tank Special Issue, No. 6 (Total No. 85), April 2023, submitted to the Chinese Academy of Engineering and the Hubei Provincial Party Committee and Provincial Government.

He has been awarded a First-Class Prize for Military Scientific and Technological Progress, and has been selected into Jiangxi Province's "Double Thousand Plan" as well as the high-level talent programs of Hangzhou and Nanchang cities.