The first super cosmic ray source has been confirmed by "Lasso", the world's first brain like complementary vision chip has been successfully developed, and Chang'e-6 has achieved the world's first moon back sampling return... Looking back at 2024, China is steadily advancing towards achieving high-level technological self-reliance and self-improvement. This year, we have deeply experienced that grand narratives such as "technology changes life" and "technology achieves the future" are becoming more grounded and concrete. In the face of many uncertainties, technological innovation is truly bringing confidence and hope.
1. National Science and Technology Conference, National Science and Technology Award Conference, and Academician Conference of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Chinese Academy of Engineering are held
The prosperity of technology leads to the prosperity of the nation, and the strength of technology leads to the strength of the country. On June 24, the National Science and Technology Conference, the National Science and Technology Award Conference, the 21st Academician Conference of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the 17th Academician Conference of the Chinese Academy of Engineering were grandly held. This conference is a grand scientific and technological event held during the critical period of comprehensively promoting the construction of a powerful country and rejuvenating the nation with Chinese path to modernization, which is of great significance to accelerating the realization of self-reliance and self-improvement in high-level science and technology and building a powerful country in science and technology.
The strongest message conveyed at this conference is' Anchoring the Strategic Goal of Building a Technological Power by 2035 '. There are only 11 years left until we achieve the goal of building a strong technological country. With the firm determination and tenacious will to 'sharpen a sword in ten years', we must seize every day, work hard, and take one step at a time to turn this strategic goal into reality. "General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech was resounding and powerful.
The sound of the "Charge" signals the beginning of a new journey. This conference has pointed out the direction for scientific and technological work in the new era, further unified thinking, deepened understanding, and consolidated the innovative power of building a strong country in science and technology.
2. "Lasso" confirms the first super cosmic ray source
Where do high-energy cosmic rays come from? This is a mystery of the century. The new discovery of China's high-altitude cosmic ray observation station "LHAASO" has brought us one step closer to unraveling this mystery.
On February 26th, Science Bulletin published an important achievement on the origin of high-energy cosmic rays. Using observational data from "Lasso", Chinese scientists have discovered a giant, ultra-high energy gamma ray bubble like structure in the star forming region of Cygnus, and have identified candidate celestial bodies with energies exceeding 100 billion electron volts for the origin of cosmic rays. This is the first confirmed super cosmic ray source by humans to date.
Cosmic rays are charged particles from outer space, mainly composed of protons, carrying important scientific information on the origin of the universe, celestial evolution, and other aspects. Exploring the mystery of the origin of cosmic rays is one of the major cutting-edge scientific issues in contemporary astrophysics.
It is reported that the giant ultra-high energy gamma ray bubble like structure discovered by "Lasso" is about 5000 light-years away from us and has a scale exceeding 10 million solar systems. There are multiple photons with energies exceeding 10 quadrillion electron volts inside the bubble like structure, with the highest reaching 20 quadrillion electron volts.
Generally speaking, generating gamma photons with an energy of 2 quadrillion electron volts requires cosmic ray particles with an energy at least 10 times higher, "said Yang Ruizhi, the corresponding author of the paper and a professor at the University of Science and Technology of China. This indicates the existence of a super cosmic ray source inside the bubble like structure, continuously producing high-energy cosmic ray particles with an energy of at least 200 quadrillion electron volts and injecting them into interstellar space.
Research has shown that the massive constant star cluster (Cygnus OB2 star association) located near the center of the bubble like structure is the most likely corresponding celestial body for the super cosmic ray source.
3. Cracking the Genetic Secrets of Hybrid Rice
Compound grain rice is a unique rice germplasm resource, which is distinct from the seeds on ordinary rice spikes. The seeds it produces can grow three grains in one cluster, hence it is also known as the "Three Grain Strange". But the mechanism behind this' three particles, one cluster 'characteristic has always been a mystery.
On March 8th, it was learned from the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences that researchers from the academy and other institutions have successfully deciphered the genetic mystery of "three grains and one cluster" in compound rice, revealing the mechanism by which brassinosteroids regulate the number of grains per panicle in rice, providing a new theoretical basis and path for cultivating high-yield rice varieties. The relevant research results were published on the same day in the journal Science.
In this work, the research team spent 7 years conducting large-scale chemical mutagenesis on the germplasm of compound grain rice, creating 10000 (about 160000 individual plants) mutant lines of compound grain rice. By identifying the panicle characteristics one by one in the field, 2 non clustered mutant lines were selected, and the mutated gene BRD3 was successfully located.
Through further analysis, the research team found that brassinosteroids can regulate the number of grains per panicle by regulating the secondary branching of rice panicles.
Experimental results have shown that it is precisely under the action of the mutated gene BRD3 that the content of brassinosteroids, a hormone, decreases, leading to an increase in secondary branches of compound rice panicles, resulting in the phenomenon of "three grains per cluster".
Cao Yongsheng, Vice President of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, stated that the breakthrough in rice yield relies on the excavation and utilization of major genes in germplasm resources. The discovery of the mechanism by which brassinosteroids regulate rice grain number provides a new perspective for improving rice yield.
The first realization of fractional quantum anomalous Hall states with 4 photons
On May 6, the reporter learned from the Chinese Academy of Sciences that, using the "bottom-up" quantum simulation method, the team of academicians Pan Jianwei of the University of Science and Technology of China realized the fractional quantum anomalous Hall state of photons for the first time in the world, providing a new path for more and more innovative quantum state research. The relevant research results were published in the journal Science.
The Hall effect refers to the effect of Lorentz force on electrons when current passes through a material placed in a magnetic field, generating a voltage perpendicular to the direction of current and magnetic field inside the material. This effect is widely used in the field of electromagnetic sensing. The anomalous Hall effect refers to the observation of related effects without the need for an external magnetic field. The quantum Hall effect is the quantum mechanical version of the Hall effect, which can only be observed under extreme conditions of low temperature and strong magnetic field.
The quantum Hall effect can be divided into integer quantum Hall effect and fractional quantum Hall effect based on the different interaction modes between electrons, "said Pan Jianwei. Among them, fractional quantum Hall states exhibit non trivial multi-body entanglement and have important observational and research value, receiving high attention from the academic community for many years.
In this study, the team utilized a "bottom-up" approach based on a self-developed superconducting high anharmonic optical resonator array to achieve nonlinear interactions between photons. Furthermore, an equivalent magnetic field acting on photons was constructed in this system to construct an artificial gauge field, thereby achieving fractional quantum anomalous Hall states of photons.
Nobel laureate in Physics Frank Wilczek commented that this research takes an important step towards quantum information processing based on anyons.
The world's first brain like complementary visual chip has been successfully developed
After the release of the world's first heterogeneous fusion brain chip "Tianji Xin" in 2019, the brain computing research team of the Precision Instrument Department of Tsinghua University has made new breakthroughs in the field of brain like visual perception chips, developing the world's first brain like complementary visual chip "Tianmu Xin". The relevant research results were published as a cover article in the journal Nature on May 30th.
Shi Luping, the corresponding author of the paper and a professor in the Department of Precision Instruments at Tsinghua University, introduced that in the open world, intelligent systems not only need to deal with huge amounts of data, but also need to deal with extreme scenarios such as sudden danger in driving scenes, severe light changes at tunnel entrances, and strong nighttime flash interference. However, traditional visual perception chips often experience distortion, failure, or high latency in such scenarios, which limits the stability and security of the system.
To better address the above issues, the research team focuses on the technology of neuromorphic visual perception chips and proposes a new paradigm of complementary dual pathway neuromorphic visual perception based on visual primitives.
This paradigm draws on the basic principles of the human visual system, breaking down open world visual information into information representations based on visual primitives, and organically combining these primitives to mimic the characteristics of the human visual system, forming two complementary and informative visual perception pathways. Based on this new paradigm, the team's "Tianmu Xin" not only breaks through the performance bottleneck of traditional visual perception paradigms, but also efficiently responds to various extreme scenarios, ensuring the stability and safety of the system.
Chang'e-6 mission achieves the world's first return of samples from the far side of the moon
Dare to climb up to the moon, laugh and sing happily!
On June 25th, on the Amugulang Grassland in Siziwang Banner, Inner Mongolia, a giant red and white parachute slowly descended, and the Chang'e-6 spacecraft returned to the ground. Thus, Chang'e-6 has accomplished the world's first feat of sampling and returning samples from the far side of the moon. This is the most complex deep space exploration mission carried out by our country so far.
The Chang'e-6 mission has a long cycle, multiple engineering innovations, high risks, and great difficulty. It has broken through key technologies such as lunar retrograde orbit design and control, intelligent rapid sampling on the lunar back, and lunar back takeoff and ascent.
After 53 days of self launch, Chang'e-6 successfully returned 1935.3 grams of lunar samples, overcoming multiple challenges including ground to moon transfer, near moon braking, lunar orbit flight, landing descent, lunar surface work, lunar ascent, rendezvous and sample transfer, lunar orbit waiting, lunar ground transfer, and re-entry recovery.
These precious samples from the far side of the moon not only fill the historical gap in research on the far side of the moon, but also provide us with first-hand information on the early evolution of the moon, and open up new perspectives for understanding the geological differences between the far and near sides of the moon.
On November 15th, good news came from the study of lunar samples: two independent research results made by Chinese scientists using lunar samples from Chang'e-6 have been published in the top international academic journals Nature and Science. These two studies reveal for the first time that there was still young magmatic activity on the far side of the moon about 2.8 billion years ago, filling the record gap of lunar basalt samples during this period.
Subsequently, on December 20th, Nature reported that Chinese scientists obtained the first human lunar back paleomagnetic field information by analyzing samples from the lunar back of Chang'e-6.
The completion and opening of the Shenzhen Zhongshan Passage, a major national engineering project, has opened for traffic
As far as the the Pearl River Estuary is concerned, the urban agglomeration on both banks, once separated by Lingdingyang, is closely connected by a super project.
On June 30th, the national major project Shenzhen Zhongshan Passage, which took 7 years to construct, was completed and opened, reducing the travel time from Shenzhen to Zhongshan from 2 hours to 30 minutes. The total length of the Shenzhen Zhongshan Passage is about 24 kilometers, integrating "bridges, islands, tunnels, and underwater interconnectivity", and is one of the most difficult cross sea cluster projects in the world for comprehensive construction.
As the key "horizontal" of the "A" shaped transportation network framework around the Pearl River Estuary, the Shenzhong Channel crosses the Lingdingyang Ocean, enabling the two major urban agglomerations of "Shenguan Hui" and "Zhuzhong River" on both sides of the the Pearl River Estuary to realize a direct connection across the sea.
During the construction process, the project team created 10 "world firsts", including the world's first underwater highway hub interchange - airport interchange, the world's longest two-way eight lane underwater immersed tube tunnel, the world's largest span all offshore steel box girder suspension bridge, and the world's highest bridge deck and highest navigable clearance sea bridge.
Since its construction, the Shenzhen Zhongshan Expressway has obtained over 200 invention patents, dozens of industry association awards, and has repeatedly received international acclaim. In April 2024, the Shenzhong Bridge was awarded the George Richardson Prize at the International Bridge Conference, known as the "Nobel Prize" in the field of bridges, and the Shenzhong Tunnel was named one of the "50 iconic projects in the global tunnel and underground engineering field".
We insist on independent innovation of key technologies and firmly grasp the leading role of innovation in our own hands, "said Song Shenyou, director and chief engineer of the Shenzhen China Channel Management Center. The Shenzhen China Channel has completed multiple technological innovations, especially in the field of steel shell concrete immersed tube tunnel design and construction, forming original achievements and achieving a breakthrough from 0 to 1, contributing Chinese solutions to the construction of world cross sea channel projects.
Breakthrough in the treatment of autoimmune diseases with 8 allogeneic universal CAR-T therapies
On July 16th, the journal Cell published online the clinical research results of Professor Xu Huji's team from the Second Affiliated Hospital of Naval Medical University (Shanghai Changzheng Hospital): Three patients with severe recurrent refractory rheumatic immune diseases showed significant improvement in their condition after receiving universal chimeric antigen receptor T-cell immunotherapy (CAR-T) treatment. This is the first successful use of allogeneic universal CAR-T therapy for autoimmune diseases internationally.
How to improve the cure rate of rheumatic and immune diseases, minimize the incidence and disability rate, and enhance the quality of life of patients is a global medical challenge. In recent years, biological agents and targeted small molecule drugs have made great progress in the treatment of rheumatic and immune diseases, but they are still ineffective for many patients or recur after improvement, and patients eventually develop life-threatening complications.
Xu Huji introduced that CAR-T, as an innovative treatment method, has shown good efficacy in the treatment of malignant tumors such as B lymphocytes (hereinafter referred to as "B cells"). Abnormal development and dysfunction of B cells are key factors in the pathogenesis of some rheumatic and immune diseases. The team used T cells from healthy donors and genetically engineered them to prepare a universal targeted CAR-T cell drug targeting B cell CD19, achieving mass production of CAR-T cell drugs. Using this cell drug, Professor Xu Huji's team successfully treated three patients with severe recurrent refractory rheumatic and immune diseases.
Xu Huji stated that this study not only provides new treatment options for patients with rheumatic and immune diseases who currently lack effective treatment methods, but also demonstrates the enormous potential of universal CAR-T cell therapy in terms of effectiveness and safety.
9 first domestically produced mobile operating systems released
On October 22nd, China's first domestically produced mobile operating system, Huawei's HarmonyOS NEXT, was officially released. This is the third largest mobile operating system in the world after Apple's iOS and Android systems.
The native HarmonyOS released this time has significantly improved in terms of smoothness, performance, and security features, comprehensively breaking through the core technology of the operating system, achieving full self-developed system base, and also achieving independent controllability of domestic operating systems.
Due to not relying on core technologies such as foreign programming languages and operating system kernels, the native HarmonyOS operating system is also known as "pure blood HarmonyOS". On November 26th, the Huawei Mate 70 series smartphones equipped with the native HarmonyOS operating system were officially released, marking the official commercial use of Huawei's native HarmonyOS operating system.
Huawei's Executive Director, Chairman of Terminal Business, and Chairman of Intelligent Automotive Solutions Business, Yu Chengdong, introduced that the native HarmonyOS is at the forefront of the industry in terms of battery life, security, and privacy protection.
It is reported that HarmonyOS was established in 2015 and continues to develop operating system root technology, completing the 30-year journey of its peers in less than 10 years. In 2019, Huawei officially released the HarmonyOS system to the public, and in 2021, the system was officially installed on smartphones. In September 2023, Huawei announced the full launch of HarmonyOS native applications, which means that the HarmonyOS system will completely use its own "kernel" and no longer rely on open source code from other operating systems. The HarmonyOS system, which accelerates innovation, not only brings new opportunities for the development of various links in the domestic terminal, software and other industrial chains, but also drives the digital transformation of various industries and fields.
Top 10 ocean drilling ships' Dream 'officially put into service
Breaking through the Earth's crust and entering the depths of the earth has been a long-standing scientific dream of humanity. Now, China's latest scientific research vessel is expected to turn this dream into reality.
On November 17th, the first ocean drilling vessel "Dream" independently designed and built by China with a maximum drilling depth of 11000 meters was officially commissioned in Guangzhou.
The "Dream" has a total length of 179.8 meters, a width of 32.8 meters, a displacement of 42600 tons, a range of 15000 nautical miles, a self-sustaining capacity of 120 days, and a crew of 180 people. Its stability and structural strength are designed according to the safety requirements of a Category 16 super typhoon, and it can operate normally under Category 6 sea conditions, with the ability to operate in unlimited navigation areas in global waters.
Zhang Haibin, the chief designer of the "Dream" vessel at the 708th Research Institute of China Shipbuilding Industry, introduced that the "Dream" vessel adopts a modular design concept, overcomes multiple world-class ship design challenges, and innovatively integrates multiple functions such as ocean scientific drilling, deep-sea oil and gas exploration, and natural gas hydrate exploration and trial production for the first time internationally, building China's independent ultra deep water drilling equipment design and construction technology system. After two rounds of sea trials, the main performance indicators of the "Dream" are better than the design requirements.
As a globally leading deep-sea operation platform, the scientific research experiment function and information technology level of the "Dream" are internationally leading. The entire ship is equipped with nine functional laboratories, including basic geology, paleomagnetism, inorganic geochemistry, organic geochemistry, microbiology, marine science, natural gas hydrates, geophysics, drilling technology, etc. The total area exceeds 3000 square meters and is equipped with the world's first shipborne core automatic transmission and storage system, which can meet the research needs of all disciplines in the marine field.
The successful sea trial of the "Dream" vessel and its official entry into service marks an important step forward for China in deep-sea entry, exploration, and development. It is another major achievement in building a strong maritime and technological country.