The 2023 National Highest Science and Technology Award was announced in Beijing on June 24, and Academician Li Deren and Academician Xue Qikun won high honors in China's science and technology community.
Li Deren is a well-known photogrammetry and remote sensing scientist, who has been committed to improving the level of land observation in mainland surveying, mapping and remote sensing. He has overcome the core technology of global high-precision positioning and mapping of satellite remote sensing, solved a series of problems in high-precision processing of remote sensing satellite images, led the team to develop a fully automatic high-precision aerial and ground measurement system, and made outstanding contributions to the construction of high-precision and high-resolution earth observation system in the mainland.
Xue Qikun is a well-known scientist in the field of condensed matter physics and has made a number of leading and important scientific breakthroughs. He led his team to observe the quantum anomalous Hall effect for the first time, which had a significant academic impact in the world. The discovery of interface-enhanced high-temperature superconductivity in heterojunction systems has opened a new research direction in the field of international high-temperature superconductivity.
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His doctoral dissertation
Solve the century-old problem of the world's metrology
Academician Li Deren is an internationally renowned photogrammetry and remote sensing scientist, and although he is 85 years old, he is still active in the front line of scientific research.
Lee De-in in middle school
In 1939, Li Deren was born in Taixian County, Jiangsu Province (now Jiangyan District, Taizhou City, Jiangsu) in a scholarly family, and had excellent grades since childhood. When he graduated from high school, he was admitted to Hubei from Jiangsu, and he was unexpectedly admitted to the Wuhan Institute of Surveying, Mapping and Cartography, which had just been established for one year, majoring in aerial photogrammetry.
Li Deren's transcript in middle school showed five points in Chinese, geometry, trigonometry, algebra, and geography.
In the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China, large-scale economic construction and national defense construction urgently needed map data, and the development of surveying and mapping technology was imminent. After arduous preparation, in 1956, Wuhan Institute of Surveying and Mapping was established, and Li Deren met his mentor Wang Zhizhuo here.
In 1982, Li Deren was given the opportunity to go to the Federal Republic of Germany for exchange and study, and under the recommendation of Wang Zhizhuo, he studied under Professor Ackermann, an internationally renowned photogrammetry and remote sensing scientist.
At that time, Ackermann gave him a challenging problem in the field of aerial surveying. "The problem is to find a theory that can distinguish between accidental error, systematic error, and gross error at the same time." Li Deren responded.
The problem of error was a worldwide problem at that time, and as a visiting scholar, Li Deren only spent more than two years in Germany. However, his supervisor, Professor Ackermann, provided support to Li Deren by allowing him to sit in a chair and use three terminals at the same time, and also provided him with financial assistance.
Li Deren worked more than ten hours a day, and finally completed his doctoral thesis in German in only one year and four months. And his doctoral dissertation solved a century-old problem in the world's surveying.
After returning from Germany, Li Deren's main research area is aerial photogrammetry. After returning to China, he received an important and arduous task of mapping the border between China and a neighboring country.
Li Deren proposed to "put GPS on the plane" and used the "GPS aerial triangulation" technology to complete the boundary mapping task, and then successively completed the aerial survey and mapping of Hainan Island and Tiger Leaping Gorge on the mainland. This is the first time that the Chinese have reduced manual field survey work through the airborne GPS system, and it is also a struggle to catch up with the advanced level of international aerial surveying.
In 2008, the United States had more than 400 satellites in orbit. At that time, many developed countries in the world already had their own high-resolution earth observation satellite systems, while China could only catch up.
At that time, the mainland's core components relied on imports, and they could only buy inferior hardware, but Li Deren said: "It must be as good as others, and the hardware is insufficient and the software is supplemented!" The problem of the device is made up by computer theories and algorithms, and artificial intelligence methods, and we solve this problem. ”
In 2010, the major project of the mainland's high-resolution earth observation system was fully launched, and Li Deren served as the deputy leader of the project. With the implementation of the "high-resolution project", China's remote sensing satellite research, which is nearly 30 years later than that of Western countries, has achieved leapfrog development from "have" to "good", the satellite resolution has been increased to 0.5 meters for civilian use, and the remote sensing information service time has been shortened from several hours to 8 minutes, catching up with the world's advanced level.
He is the president of the university who has been admitted to graduate school three times
Won international awards
On October 24, 2023, Tsinghua University and Southern University of Science and Technology successively issued documents to congratulate Xue Qikun, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, professor of Tsinghua University, and president of Southern University of Science and Technology, for winning the 2024 Buckley Award. It is understood that this is the first time that the prize has been awarded to a Chinese physicist since it was first awarded in 1953.
The quantum anomalous Hall effect, a scientific effect based on completely new physical principles, is known as the crown jewel of physics research. Since 1998, theoretical physicists have been proposing various schemes, but no progress has been made in experiments.
Xue Qikun, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, professor of Tsinghua University, and president of Southern University of Science and Technology, chose to climb this mountain without hesitation. His steps are paved with atoms layer by layer. He led the team to prepare more than 1,000 samples, experienced countless failures, and improved again and again, and finally, for the first time, the quantum anomalous Hall effect was observed experimentally.
This is one of the most important physical effects discovered by continental physicists, and it is also a major original breakthrough in the field of international condensed matter physics in recent years. Yang Zhenning, a famous physicist and Nobel laureate, commented: "This is an important contribution of Chinese physicists to the treasure house of human scientific knowledge. This is the first Nobel Prize-level physics paper to be published in a Chinese laboratory. ”
The road to research has not been easy. Previously, Xue Qikun has shared his study and scientific research experience many times. An article in China Science Daily mentioned that in 1984, Xue Qikun took the postgraduate examination and scored 39 points in advanced mathematics.
As a young man who "aspires to become a scientist", he spent two years reviewing, and in 1986, he took the postgraduate examination again, and scored 39 points in the general physics exam. It wasn't until 1987 that I was finally admitted to graduate school.
According to Tsinghua University, Xue Qikun has had many "titles"-
In an interview with the media, he humbly compared himself to "a small boat sailing out of the Yimeng Mountains", and was once called "Mr. 7-11" because he started working in the laboratory at 7 a.m. and left at 11 p.m.
Today, Xue Qikun holds many positions such as scientific research, talent training, and administrative affairs, and his working hours are longer than those of the "7-11" in the past.
He encouraged himself and called on all Chinese scientists to always face the major needs of the country, use basic research to help the technological revolution and industrial renewal, and promote social progress and people's happiness. We must always face the world's frontier of science and technology, contribute Chinese wisdom to the development of world science with unremitting efforts, and play a strong voice of science belonging to Chinese on the top international academic stage!