Sun Xiangzhen, the father of MO Source: He was once suspected of defrauding scientific research funds, and finally broke through the encirclement and suppression of the United States in one fell swoop

This old man is called Sun Xiangzhen, in the context of the West encircling China and monopolizing high technology, Sun Xiangzhen led the team to overcome difficulties, not only developed the first domestic ArF photoresist, but also founded the company is the top two manufacturers in the global MO source market share, he himself is also known as "the father of China's MO source".

However, in the process of Sun Xiangzhen's research and development, some people suspect that he is a "liar" and that he is leading the research "to defraud the state scientific research funds", so, in the voice of everyone's doubts and under difficult conditions, how did Sun Xiangzhen break through the Western monopoly step by step and fight for the mainland? In this issue, let's take a look at Sun Xiangzhen, the father of China's MO source.

In the 1950s and 1960s, that is, after the outbreak of the Korean War, the United States manipulated the United Nations to adopt a "Resolution on the Implementation of the Embargo on China", as can be seen from the name, the purpose of this resolution is a total blockade and embargo against China, which is also known as the United Nations ban, which was implemented for 20 years, until nixon's visit to China in 1972, which was one of the backgrounds of the Western blockade of China's development.

In addition, there is a Paris Coordinating Committee, referred to as "Batumi", its official name is "Export Control Coordinating Committee", secretly established in November 1949 under the proposal of the United States, Batumi prohibits the export of strategic materials and high technology to socialist countries, and the embargo list includes three categories of military weapons and equipment, cutting-edge technological products and rare materials, tens of thousands of products.

And it is not only socialist countries that are listed as the target of the embargo, but also some nationalist countries, a total of about 30, which shows how domineering the United States and Western countries are in the field of technology.

At that time, China, as a rapidly developing country, became the focus of the United States and the West, and the "Paris Coordinating Committee" also imposed an EMBAR on MO sources on China, even after the dissolution of the "Paris Coordinating Committee", the United States and Western countries still controlled exports to China, which is the background of Sun Xiangzhen's research on MO sources.

So, what is a MO source? Why is the U.S. taking this technology so seriously?

First of all, the so-called MO source, that is, high-purity metal organic compounds, is the support source material of the modern compound semiconductor industry, and the compound semiconductor material is the key material in high-end fields such as national defense and aerospace, and the technology monopoly is strong.

To put it simply, the MO source can be applied to the semiconductor field, but also in aircraft, tank forward vision, missile guidance instrument and satellite communications, radar, telemetry remote control, meteorological medicine and other aspects, so it is a very critical strategic material, high-tech industry and national defense and security have important strategic significance.

It is worth noting that the MO source industry has obvious oligopoly market characteristics, and there are very few manufacturers of MO sources in the world, and only a few companies in China, the United States, Europe, and Japan have the ability to industrialize production.

According to QYResaerch data, the world's most important MO source manufacturers in 2019 are SAFC Hitech, Nanda Optoelectronics, Nouryon, etc., of which Nanda Optoelectronics in the mainland is the second largest manufacturer in the global MO source market share, with a market share of nearly 30%.

The founder of Nanda Optoelectronics is Sun Xiangzhen.

In 1986, the Department of Chemistry of Nanjing University gathered a group of crazy people who wanted to engage in MO sources, because at that time, the Western "Paris Coordinating Committee" had already designated MO sources as embargoed materials for China.

However, people know that the strategic significance of the MO source to the mainland's national defense and security and high-tech national industry is too great, and the West is hegemonic in engaging in embargoes and technological blockades.

In this regard, the leader Sun Xiangzhen replied categorically, we engage in our own MO source.

According to public information, Sun Xiangzhen once said a particularly classic sentence, he said, "We can't let people get stuck in the neck, we can't be subject to people." People must have a little spirit, otherwise the party and the state have cultivated us, but we cannot share the worries of the country. ”

With this spirit and courage, Sun Xiangzhen and this group of scientists invested in research and development.

But there is a popular saying that although the ideal is plump, the reality is very bone, MO source is a very special material, and the synthesis preparation process is very dangerous, requiring purity to reach 99.999%, that is, more than 5N, to achieve this requirement itself has been very difficult, but in addition, MO source also has very harsh requirements for filling containers, analytical methods and testing instruments.

You know, at that time, China in that era was just waking up, and the development of science and technology in the West had lagged behind a long way, and it was almost "difficult to ascend to the sky" if it wanted to study the MO source.

Because with the conditions and experience at that time, the laboratory has never got such an ultra-pure product, that is to say, what others can do, we may not be able to do.

This difficulty is like a mountain in front of you, it seems that there is no hope of climbing, but Sun Xiangzhen has not given up, just as the so-called scientific "madman" must have its superiority, and the vision is not ordinary.

Sun Xiangzhen believes that since the West has commercialized the scale of products, indicating that the 5N MO source already has a feasible synthesis, purification, detection, filling route and method, he carefully analyzed our advantages, and listed the mainland's scientific research achievements, such as atomic bombs, hydrogen bombs and aerospace science and technology, etc., are developed under very difficult conditions.

To this end, Sun Xiangzhen shouted out a slogan, that is, "Foreigners can do it, we must be able to do it!" ”

This has become the mantra that Sun Xiangzhen has been hanging on his lips for 25 years, he found the goal, firmly believed, and led this group of scientists to carry out almost "crazy" experiments in the laboratory, and this "madness" is 15 years.

In the past 15 years, Sun Xiangzhen and a number of scientists have gone through thousands of experiments, obtained tens of millions of data, thick experimental records are stacked one after another, and countless energy has been paid, and scientific research results have finally been achieved.

I have to say that behind every scientific and technological progress is countless experimental failures, there are many chemical synthesis methods of MO sources, in order to find the "optimal solution", you must pass a large number of experiments, and these experiments also have a certain degree of danger, because raw materials will burn when they see air, explode when they meet water, not to mention that the research and development environment at that time was extremely simple.

Every time to this critical moment, Sun Xiangzhen always preempts others, dangerous experiments are done first, it is said that the noise of self-made experimental refrigeration equipment is like a propeller airplane, shocking people's heads, causing many people to go home from work and their ears have been chirping.

Sun Xiangzhen is now deaf in his right ear and has to wear a hearing aid, which is caused by the noise at that time.

As the old saying goes, Kung Fu pays off, and Sun Xiangzhen has finally obtained the most advanced preparation technology route in the world after experiment after experiment.

However, in the more than ten years that Sun Xiangzhen has been immersed in research, many people have questioned his research, because after all, the research and development environment and basic conditions are poor, can moo sources that meet the purity requirements be developed in this case? This issue is very controversial even among its counterparts in the chemical industry, and there are even voices suspecting that Sun Xiangzhen is a "liar" and that the lead research is "trying to defraud the national scientific research funds".

These doubts and speculations, even smears, Sun Xiangzhen survived.

During the "Eighth Five-Year Plan" period, Sun Xiangzhen led the team to develop a variety of MO sources of 5.5N, which not only directly broke the long-standing hegemonic monopoly of the West, but also provided valuable impetus for the development of compound semiconductor materials in the mainland.

I have to say that Sun Xiangzhen's title of "father of China's MO source" can be described as deserved, after retirement, Sun Xiangzhen wants to transform the MO source scientific research results developed by Nanjing University into market products, so he led young people to start a business and founded the famous Nanda Optoelectronics.

At the beginning of the establishment of the company, it was also wildly suppressed by foreign companies, who while reducing prices, used high salary lures to poach a large number of backbones from the management and sales team of Nanda Optoelectronics.

External high pressure and internal "bottom salary", can be described as a two-pronged approach, so that Nanda Optoelectronics has just been born to be greatly tested.

In this regard, Sun Xiangzhen, who is already an elderly man, encourages everyone while fully investing and controlling the various joints of the company, a person who is both a general manager and a technical director, and a salesman, with sales staff running all over the country customers.

Looking at the rise of Nanda Optoelectronics, the outside "Jackal Tiger And Leopard" continues to use the price to exert pressure, in the face of this harsh environment, Sun Xiangzhen made a bold decision, he directly wrote to the superior leaders for help, the progress of the Nanda Optoelectronic Project has been highly valued by leaders at all levels such as Beijing, Nanjing, Suzhou, etc. Private entrepreneur Zhang Xingguo directly invested nearly 10 million yuan in the difficult company, and finally survived the difficulties.

Sun Xiangzhen regards Nanda Optoelectronics as his "child", and this child has finally grown up to adulthood, and Nanda Optoelectronics has been "outstanding in battle" since its establishment.

After the acquisition of Feiyuan in 2019, Feiyuan Gas has become one of the world's leading producers of nitrogen trifluoride and sulfur hexafluoride.

In December 2020, the ArF photoresist product independently developed by Nanda Optoelectronics successfully passed the Wuhan Xinxin use certification, becoming the first domestic ArF photoresist to pass product verification, breaking the situation that high-grade photoresist in mainland China is subject to people.

At the same time, NTU Optoelectronics is also the world's leading PRODUCER of MO sources.

It can be said that Sun Xiangzhen can bring out such an excellent enterprise, which is inseparable from his own perseverance and bravery, as well as patriotism, and hopes that more and more entrepreneurs like Sun Xiangzhen will emerge in China in the future!