Guo Xinxin: Bringing Chinese electron microscopy to the world

Guo Xinxin (1923.8.23—2006.12.13), born in Beijing, ancestral home of Fuzhou, Fujian, is a famous physical, metallurgical and crystallographer, and academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In 1941, he was admitted to the Department of Chemical Engineering of Zhejiang University, studied in Sweden in 1947, studied at the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden, Uppsala University in Sweden, and later engaged in the research of carbides and intermetallic compounds in alloy steel at the Royal Institute of Technology in Delft, the Netherlands. After returning to China in 1956, he successively served as the director of the Department of Metal Physics of the Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, the deputy director of the Institute of Metal Research, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the president of the Shenyang Branch of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the director of the Beijing Electron Microscope Open Laboratory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the researcher of the Institute of Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. In 1980, he was elected as a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and in the same year, he was awarded the Foreign Academician of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences.

Guo Xinxin is one of the founders of the Continental Electron Microscopy Society, and has outstanding achievements in the fields of electron microscopy and crystallography. He promoted continental electron microscopy to the world, led the team to the peak of quasicrystalline research, and made great contributions to the world's forefront of continental quasicrystalline experimental research.

The Northeast fell, and he went to study in the war

Guo Xinxin was born in Beijing in 1923, the son of a civil engineer in railways. In 1926, Guo Xinxin's father went to Heilongjiang to build a railway, and the family moved to Harbin. Five years later, the September 18 Incident broke out, and Japanese imperialism began a full-scale invasion of China. In February 1932, under the fierce artillery attack of Japanese aircraft, tanks and armored vehicles, Harbin fell, and Guo Xinxin, then 9 years old, experienced the pain of losing his home for the first time.

In 1936, Guo Xinxin followed his father to Tianjin and studied in the second year of junior high school in Tianjin Nankai Middle School. After the July 7 Incident in 1937, the Japanese army invaded Tianjin, and Nankai Middle School was forced to move west to Chongqing. In order to continue studying, he traveled for more than 2 months and came to Chongqing after all kinds of hardships, but the ordeal did not end. In his later years, he recalled: "In Nankai for four years, the experience of 'running the alarm' cannot but be mentioned. In the late spring of 1939, the fog dissipated, and the Japanese planes went up the river and attacked Chongqing at night, and the sky over Chongqing was dyed red. 'Running the alarm' has become commonplace, as soon as the alarm sounds, roll up the tarpaulin and leave, and sleep when you reach the ground. Sometimes I run twice a night, and I am used to it, and I still go to class during the day. "Once, the sky fell apart and the earth was blown apart, and the branches of dirt and trees flew all over the sky", and the Japanese air raid left a permanent scar on the back of 16-year-old Guo Xin.

Serve the country with enthusiasm and resolutely join the army in the midst of artillery fire

In the summer of 1941, accompanied by the sound of sharp sirens, Guo Xin completed the college entrance examination in the air-raid shelter and was admitted to Zhejiang University, which was located in Zunyi, Guizhou Province at that time. The mountains and rivers are broken, where can I put a calm desk. The study conditions in Zunyi are very difficult, "Zhejiang University could not find a place to accommodate more than 1,000 teachers and students, so it had to be divided into three places: Zunyi, Meitan and Yongxingchang. At that time, there were no electric lights in Zunyi, let alone Meitan and Yongxingchang, which were not even accessible by road at that time."

In 1944, when the Japanese army invaded Guizhou, the Kuomintang army collapsed, so the Kuomintang authorities called on young students to join the army to resist Japan. At this time, Guo Xinxin, who was in his fourth year of college, saw with his own eyes "malnourished, skinny, and lifeless captured strong men" during the labor process of the Zhejiang University Student Autonomous Association, and deeply felt that "it is no wonder that a thousand Japanese cavalry can drive hundreds of miles into and out like no man's land." Inspired by the call of "the rise and fall of the country, the husband is responsible", he was about to graduate and resolutely interrupted his studies in order to protect his family and defend the country, and signed up for the army. In January 1945, he was assigned to the 604th Regiment of the 202nd Division of the Kuomintang Army, and was later assigned to the interpreter training class to learn English, and then assigned to the infantry training center, but surrendered before he could go to the battlefield to kill the enemy. In August 1945, Guo Xinxin ended his short military career, took the document of honorable retirement, and returned to Zhejiang University. In 1946, he took the second government-funded study abroad examination and became the only student admitted to the Department of Chemical Engineering at that time.

Guo Xinxin, who had experienced the hardships of the war, personally experienced the great pain and humiliation brought by the Japanese invasion of China to the Chinese people, which also inspired his deep and lasting patriotic enthusiasm and determination to serve the motherland. He once wrote: "Our generation grew up in the crisis of national ruin and the bombing of enemy planes, and the concept of the country is relatively strong and the national consciousness is relatively deep. Sixty years after graduation, whether it is studying overseas or working in China, I have always looked forward to a rich country and a strong army, and I will no longer be bullied. This fiery feeling of family and country directly determines his future life choices.

Studying in Europe opens up a tortuous path of scientific research

In 1947, Guo Xinxin went to study at the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden at public expense, and began to study metallurgical science under the tutelage of Professor Herter Green, an authority in metallography. He studied very hard, and as he studied the structure of X-ray crystals, he found that some of his supervisor's views on the influence of alloying elements on austenite were contradictory, and he questioned his supervisor in person. However, his tutor has a strong personality, a conservative and domineering attitude, and is not receptive to students' rebuttals and challenges. In the face of this attitude of his mentor, Guo Xinxin was deeply disappointed, firmly believing that "persistently pursuing the truth is the first spirit that a scientific worker must have" and "academic issues should be clearly distinguished, not ambiguous, and if they are in agreement, they will stay, and if they are not in agreement, they will go", he resolutely gave up his research achievements and degrees for more than three years, and left the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden.

In 1951, Guo Xinxin entered the Department of Inorganic Chemistry of Uppsala University in Sweden to study the structure of alloys using X-ray diffraction methods. Here, his studies and work went very well, he discovered a new MoC structure, and published a paper in the journal Nature in 1952 in collaboration with his supervisor. In order to improve his research on single-crystal X-ray diffraction, he came to the Royal Institute of Technology in Delft, the Netherlands in November 1955 to study, and by 1956, he had published more than 20 papers in well-known foreign academic journals, and even the widely influential German "Handbook of Alloy Steels" at that time also cited his research results many times, which established his international leading position in the research of carbides in alloy steels, when he was only 34 years old.

Although he was successful in a foreign country and far away from his homeland, he was also lonely, and how he longed to dedicate his talents and wisdom to his country without reservation. He said: "My generation has suffered greatly from the aggression of Japanese militarism, and the miserable scene of seeing the peasants having to eat Guanyin soil to survive and having to sell their sons and daughters in order to survive has always been deeply imprinted in my mind. Strengthening the country and enriching the people is the dream of intellectuals with a conscience of our generation, and I went to Europe with the desire to save the country through science. Wandering in a foreign land, he has been waiting, waiting for an opportunity to serve his country. In March 1956, when he read in the newspaper that Premier Zhou had issued a mobilization order to "march towards science", he was full of excitement and excitement, and immediately began to prepare for his return to China. At the end of April, he took the opportunity to return to his motherland after a nine-year absence via the Soviet Union, and he vowed to dedicate what he had learned in his life to the motherland and the people.

Serve the motherland and occupy the commanding heights of quasicrystalline research

After returning to China, Guo Xinxin aimed at the frontier of science and technology, established a laboratory, and spared no effort to cultivate scientific research talents. In the 50s of the 20th century, the study of crystal defects using electron diffraction contrast imaging became the forefront of international crystallography and electron microscopy research, and he immediately set about establishing an electron microscopy laboratory in the Institute of Metals, and put forward the goal of catching up with the world's advanced level. In order to let more people understand this emerging research direction, he translated a large number of foreign documents and wrote dozens of study notes of hundreds of thousands of words, which were shared with colleagues and students free of charge, and these notes were widely copied. His student Cao Hanqing once commented: "From the current point of view, it is too stupid to do this kind of thing, at least it lacks a minimum sense of competition." However, this is exactly the way of life that Guo Lao taught us, as the so-called 'to be knowledgeable, to be a man first'. ”

At the end of the 70s of the 20th century, the electron microscopy of diffraction contrast has matured in the world, and phase contrast electron microscopy at the atomic resolution level is emerging. Taking advantage of the spring of reform and opening up, he took the lead in introducing high-resolution JEM200CX electron microscope in China, led the scientific research backbone and more than 20 graduate students who had just returned to China to carry out the atomic image research of solid materials day and night, creating a precedent of 24-hour non-stop operation in China, and published a number of high-quality papers in just a few years, and submitted 9 papers at the 11th International Electron Microscopy Congress in 1986 alone, which was comparable to Japan, the "giant" of Asian electron microscopy, and successfully ranked among the advanced ranks of international electron microscopy. By 1994, Guo Xinxin led the Open Laboratory of Solid State Atomic Imaging of the Institute of Metal Research and the Beijing Open Laboratory of Electron Microscopy to publish more than 350 papers in academic journals at home and abroad, further consolidating the international leading position of Chinese electron microscopy. These two laboratories have also become important research bases and talent training bases for electron microscopy, crystallography and physical metallurgy in mainland China.

Guo Xinxin discovered the advantages of high-resolution electron microscopy in the study of crystal structure, and immediately led the scientific research team to carry out research, discovered a large number of approved crystals and a variety of quasicrystalline related phases, and achieved a series of major breakthroughs. In 1982, he won the third prize of the National Natural Science Award for the research on electron diffraction and electron microscopy of the fine structure of crystals, discovered six new phases and a variety of domain structures in the study of new equal domain structures of tetrahedral dense pile facies, broke the stagnation in this field for more than 20 years, and won the first prize of scientific and technological progress of the Chinese Academy of Sciences In 1987, he won the first prize of the National Natural Science Award, in 1988, he discovered the eightfold rotational symmetric quasicrystals and the twelveth-symmetric quasicrystals and won the third prize of the National Natural Science Award, and the stable AI-Cu-Co tenfold rotational symmetric quasicrystals and one-dimensional quasicrystals discovered in the same period won the second prize of the Natural Science Award of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Guo Xinxin's research achievements in quasicrystals can be said to represent China's highest achievement in this field. In the 80s of the 20th century, the Israeli scientist Shechtman's scientific research team and the Chinese scientific research team led by Guo Xin discovered alloys with quasicrystalline structures at almost the same time. In 2011, Shechtman was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his discovery of quasicrystals. It is a pity that Guo Xinxin died of illness and did not deserve this honor, but China's quasicrystalline research is at the forefront of the world because of him.

Establish an academic echelon to cultivate Chinese electron microscopy talents

"A single flower is not spring, a hundred flowers bloom in spring. Guo Xinxin also actively formed an academic echelon. After the reform and opening up, he strongly recommended and helped more than 10 scientific and technological personnel of the Institute of Metal Research to study in the world-class laboratories such as the United Kingdom, Sweden, the United States, and Japan. He is very strict in cultivating students, and will mercilessly criticize the students' lack of rigor and seriousness, and even tear up the experimental data and pictures that the students have "worked hard" to obtain. He said: "I am still very strict with my students, with high standards and no ambiguity. The ancients said, 'Take the law from the top, get from it'. Only high standards can motivate young people to forge ahead. "In addition to strict management, there is also love. For example, during the two years when student Zhang Ze went abroad to study, Guo Xinxin wrote nearly 100 letters to him, giving him all-round care and support. Another of his students recalled: "To my surprise, Mr. Guo not only carefully helped me revise the article, but also helped me organize the photos and transfer the legend characters to the photos. He had gray hair, took off his glasses, and looked attentive and attentive in his eyes, which I will never forget. I was greatly encouraged by his concern, and I felt that there was a warm current that warmed my heart. When Mr. Guo returned the corrected article to me, I found that he crossed out his name. ”

It is precisely in this way that Guo Xinxin has brought out a scientific research team with excellent academics and good study style. His students include Ye Hengqiang, Zhang Ze, Wan Lijun and other academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, as well as a large number of professors and researchers from universities and research institutes, who have won numerous major national and international scientific and technological awards, and have made important contributions to the physics research of metal materials in mainland China and the research of electron microscopy in the forefront of the world.

When he was in his late teens, Guo Xin commented on his life, saying: "Looking back on my life, I have only done two things academically. When he was young, he single-handedly rushed to the front line of alloy steel structure, and at the age of 60, he regrouped and led a group of young people to occupy the commanding heights of quasicrystalline research. "Unlike 40 years ago, when I was working alone abroad, "40 years later, I have made a comeback and finally pushed China's quasicrystalline research to the forefront of the world." This time, he has established this outpost on the soil of his motherland to catch up with and surpass the world's scientific level, and the comfort and pride he has received are far from being comparable to those in the past", and he attributed his success to the power of Chinese culture. He said: "The Chinese nation has a long history of 5,000 years and is the only uninterrupted, ancient and new culture in the world, which is worthy of the pride of every Chinese." It is this force that inspires me to move forward, to develop China's electron microscope in my lifetime, and occupy a place in the world. ”

On December 13, 2006, Guo Xinxin died of illness at the age of 83. Although he is no longer away from us, the spirit of a scientist embodied in him shines like crystal, remaining in the world forever and inspiring future generations.