The Galaxy Formation and Wide Field Survey (GFWFS) Research Group at Purple Mountain Observatory, Chinese Academy of Sciences, was established in 2016 to strengthen research forces on observational studies of galaxy formation and evolution as well as near-field cosmology with wide field surveys. Our research interests focus on 1). addressing how did galaxies form and evolve in different environments across cosmic time; 2) exploring the extremely low surface brightness universe ; 3) near-field cosmology with resolved and unresolved stellar populations around galaxies in the Local group and nearby universe. Recent research highlights include: 1. discovery of a universal relation of dust obscuration in star-formation galaxies (Qin J. B., Zheng X. Z. et al. 2019, MNRAS, 485, 5733) 2. Detection of star-forming ultra-diffuse galaxies in the HCG 95 field (Shi D. D., Zheng X. Z. et al. 2017, ApJ, 846, 26) 3. Finding of SSFR dispersion varying along the main sequence of star-forming galaxies in the local and distant universe (Guo K., Zheng X. Z. et al. 2015, ApJ, 808, L49; Guo K., Zheng x. Z. et al. 2013, ApJ, 778, 23) 4. Revealing the properties of Ha emission-line galaxies at z=2.24 (An F. X., Zheng X. Z., et al. 2014, ApJ, 784, 152) 5. A new non-parametric method for classifying galaxy morphologies (Wen Z. Z., Zheng X. Z., An F.X. 2014, ApJ, 787, 130) The research group is leading the conceptual study on a 2.5 meter Wide Field Survey Telescope (WFST), dedicated to mapping the 2PI northern sky in the ugrizw bands over 6 years with three key science goals: 1) time-domain astronomy; 2) solar system objects; 3) The Milk way and near-field cosmology. The telescope was founded by USTC and the construction started from July 11th, 2019.