In the early morning of April 2, the conference room of the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences was crowded with people, including young faces who had come to see him, waiting for an elderly person.
At about 9 a.m., Zheng Ruyong, an 88-year-old mycologist and academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, walked in slowly with the support of his wife, Researcher Huang He, and the people present stood up and applauded. On the same day, the scientific couple donated 1.5 million yuan of their life savings to the University Education Foundation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences to establish the "Zheng Ruyong Yellow River Scholarship".
"I just want to (inspire) young people to devote themselves to scientific research, live up to the time, and strive to move up!" After the donation ceremony, Zheng Ruyong specifically mentioned the young people, she said: "The state has trained me, the Chinese Academy of Sciences has trained me, and I want to make a little more contribution to the country." ”
Everyone present was moved by it.
On the same day, Liu Shuangjiang, director of the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, quoted the famous mathematician Su Buqing as saying: "A true patriot, without waiting for any special opportunity, he can show his love for the motherland in his post", "Mr. Zheng is like this, the couple has no children, and the two elders have walked together in life years, almost all of them are dedicated to scientific research."
Today, this "Mr. Zheng", who has "devoted his life to the classification of fungi" and "made great contributions in the field of mycology", is still thinking about how to contribute a little more residual heat.
When he was young, Zheng Ruyong had a widely circulated "four-year cold bench" scientific research story.
In 1953, after graduating from University, Zheng Ruyong entered the Laboratory of Fungal Phytology of the Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (the predecessor of the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences) and became a research intern under the tutelage of Dai Fanglan, director of the Department of Plant Pathology of China Agricultural University in Beijing and director of the Laboratory of Fungal Plant Pathology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Professor Dai Fanglan is the founder of Mycology in China and one of the founders of Plant Pathology in China. However, at the beginning, Dai Fanglan did not let Zheng Ruyong emerge in scientific research, but directly arranged her to work in the herbarium.
The specimen room preserves important specimens integrated from several units such as the College of Agriculture of Tsinghua University, the Academia Sinica, and the Beiping Research Institute, and these specimens are packaged in different packages, some in boxes, some in pockets, some large, some small, in order to facilitate scientific research, it is necessary to unify.
Zheng Ruyong's job is to label, label and repackage these important specimens.
She also remembers that there was no Chinese typewriter at that time, and every specimen instruction had to be handwritten, and she designed the packaging of the specimens herself, giving them "the same clothes, little by little, little by little."
In this way, Zheng Ruyong stayed in the herbarium for 4 years.
Looking back now, Zheng Ruyong said that when she graduated, she had an opportunity to study abroad, but in order to be able to accompany her parents and to better serve the motherland, she gave up the opportunity to study abroad. Unexpectedly, what awaited her was the "repetitive and simple" work that accompanied the specimen every day.
Zheng Ruyong said that he never regretted it, nor did he complain. In those four years, whether it was sorting out nearly 10,000 fungal specimens or dealing with the correspondence between the whole room and the masses outside the subject, these were the most monotonous and "low-level" work in the eyes of others, but she had more opportunities to "recharge".
She described these four years as "four years of calm thinking" and "four years of solid accumulation".
After that, Zheng Ruyong was hired as an intern researcher and business secretary of the fungus room of the Institute of Applied Mycology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and went from "behind the scenes" to "in front of the stage". Soon after, she published her first paper, "Collection, Production, Storage and Mailing of Specimens of Plant Diseases and Fungi", and soon after, she ushered in the golden stage of her scientific career.
The data of the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences records that Zheng Ruyong discovered the endophytic mucormycetes in higher plants for the first time in the world, and reported for the first time the new species and new variants of the unique human pathogen Muzzle mold in China; in 1987, the editor-in-chief completed the "Chinese Powdery mildew mushroom history - Powdery mildew", which became an internationally recognized powdery mildew catalogue search book. To this day, Zheng Ruyong's genus classification system of the powdery mildew family still maintains the international leading level. In 1999, Zheng Ruyong was elected as an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
In December 1958, the Institute of Applied Mycology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences merged with the Beijing Microbiology Laboratory to establish the Institute of Microbiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Zheng Ruyong became a scientific researcher in the Institute. She has been working here for more than 50 years.
An ancient microscope has witnessed Zheng Ruyong's half-century scientific research career. She often said that she spent more time with the microscope every day than she spent with her wife.
Working selflessly in front of the microscope caused her to suffer from osteoporosis and lumbar semi-slip.
In 2004, she had two steel poles and nine steel nails "nailed" to her spine, and the doctor told her that she could only sit for 1 hour a day, and the rest of the time she could only stand or lie down.
Since then, Zheng Ruyong has basically been unable to sit and work. The 73-year-old Zheng Ruyong raised his desk and experimental table and stood for more than 8 hours a day, whether it was observing the microscope or writing a thesis, whether it was hand-drawing fungal atlases or consulting literature.
This station, that is, 15 years.
Colleagues' most evaluation of Zheng Ruyong is: as a famous bridesmaid from a large family, she does not have the delicate spirit of a rich lady, and in the face of scientific research, she is not afraid of difficulties, perseverance, and dare to challenge.
Zheng Ruyong has said more than once: "Every industry has its own difficulties, but also has its own fun, as long as you are interested, you will not feel difficult." I think if you do the work that is not difficult at all, it is called dull and tasteless. I'm willing to pick a little harder work to do. Because there are difficulties, there is something to solve, and only then can we do high-level work. ”
In January 2016, Zheng Ruyong celebrated her 85th birthday, and in her old age, she staggered through the busy road to the laboratory and to the microscope she loved. She still goes to work every day as usual. (Reporter Qiu Chenhui)