At noon on October 10, Liu Chongzhi had lunch with undergraduates of Shenzhen University of Technology to share more interesting stories about her and her Nobel Prize mentors.
Liu Chongzhi (first from left) and mentor Victor Ambros (second from right) in Xi'an.
At the end of 2021, Liu Chongzhi participated in the World Strawberry Congress for the first time.
"The strange small RNA found in the frontline worm in the past 30 years does have an immeasurable impact on humans." On the evening of October 7, Professor Liu Chongzhi of Shenzhen University of Technology congratulated two new Nobel laureates Victor · Ambrose and Gary · Rubkan on social media. It turned out that she was the first doctoral student under the supervision of Victor · Ambrose.
On October 10, Liu Chongzhi, who was scheduled to teach the third class of the compulsory course "Introduction to Life Sciences" for undergraduates of Shenzhen University of Technology, specially shared the content of the theme of "Model Animals and the Nobel Prize", and told a lot of her scientific research past with the Nobel laureate leader. As a pioneer in the field of strawberry molecular biology, she also shared her scientific vision of planning to achieve a "strawberry makeover" through gene editing technology.
Returning to Shenzhen to teach
The new Nobel laureate writes a letter of recommendation for her
The 2024 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was announced in Stockholm, Sweden, on October 7, and United States scientists Victor · Ambrose and Gary · Rubkan were awarded the prize for their discovery of microRNAs and their role in the regulation of post-transcriptional genes.
Liu Zhongzhi learned that his mentor Victor · Ambrose had won the Nobel Prize in between running exercises. Seeing this news, she was not surprised at all, and even felt that her mentor "should have won the award a long time ago". Before her mentor won the Nobel Prize, Craig · Mello, who worked in the same lab as her, had already won the Nobel Prize in 2006.
At that time, some scholars believed that Victor · Ambrose, who discovered microRNA for the first time, should also win the Nobel Prize. "But my mentor was genuinely proud of his students to win the Nobel Prize, but felt that it didn't matter if they won the prize or not." In an interview with a reporter from Nandu, Liu Chongzhi said.
"I agree with a lot of experts in the field of biology that this is what everyone wants." Now that the good news came out, Liu Chongzhi was very happy and sent an email to his mentor to congratulate him.
"Before I joined Shenzhen Institute of Technology, my mentor Victor · Ambrose also wrote a letter of recommendation for me to the school!" In January this year, Liu Chongzhi, who was previously a tenured full professor at the University of Maryland United States, joined Shenzhen University of Technology full-time after 28 years of teaching at the university. Today, she is also a researcher at the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the Center for Agricultural and Plant Synthetic Biology of the Shenzhen Institute of Synthetic Sciences.
Reminiscing
Mentors often come to me and say, "I have a new idea"
"Sometimes you think that they are just ordinary researchers, and sometimes you even think that they often like to play." Recalling the time when she studied scientific research under the guidance of her mentor, Liu Chongzhi said that she did not expect that the people around her would win Nobel Prizes one after another.
However, with the help of the Nobel laureate's mentor and Nobel laureate's classmates, Liu Chongzhi's scientific research work has been carried out impressively. During her studies at Harvard University, she published three important academic papers in top academic journals such as Nature under the supervision of Victor · Ambrose. And when she first joined the mentor team, she couldn't even do experiments, and it was Craig · Mello who taught her to do experiments.
Evaluating his mentor Victor · Ambrose, Liu Chongzhi said that he has no frame, is particularly modest, and is a very honest and very good person. "Every time I talk to him about my research ideas, he encourages me and says, 'You're so smart, why are you so good?'" When he first came to United States to study, Liu Chongzhi, who was unfamiliar with his life, received a lot of encouragement and support from his mentors and classmates, and his initial sense of discomfort and inferiority complex was gradually eliminated.
"He often came to me and told me that I had a new idea." In Liu's view, mentor Victor · Ambrose is not the kind of person who behaves particularly hard, but he seems to show a love for science every day and has a strong curiosity about scientific research. "One year, when he learned that he could see a total solar eclipse in China, he immediately decided to come to China to see the total solar eclipse."
In fact, the scientific research path of these Nobel laureates is not all smooth sailing, and they have also encountered a lot of difficulties in the process of scientific research, Liu Chongzhi shared the stories of these Nobel laureates, hoping to inspire more students to be more courageous in doing scientific research.
At the end of the class, Liu Chongzhi half-jokingly said to the students: "My mentor is a Nobel laureate, my mentor's mentor is also a Nobel laureate, and my mentor's mentor is also a Nobel laureate." Could it be that this is heredity? If it's really genetic, then will you inherit it too? Hearing her say this, smiles bloomed on the faces of youth, and the seeds of hope were buried in their hearts at this time, waiting for the next day to break through the ground.
After listening to Liu Chongzhi's class, students from Shenzhen University of Technology came to the podium to communicate with the teacher. In class, he learned that Victor · Ambrose completed the research in 1993 and won the Nobel Prize in 2024. ”
"The discovery of microRNA is full of twists and turns, just as scientific research is not all smooth sailing, requiring interest, patience and perseverance." Wang Zhaoxuan, the first undergraduate student of Shenzhen University of Technology, also shared her feelings. In the future, Wang Zhaoxuan hopes to learn more about the field of synthetic biology in the school under the leadership of top professors in the industry.
The path of scientific research
We look forward to adding more value to strawberries
Born and raised in Guangzhou, Liu Chongzhi went to the Department of Biology of Wuhan University in 1978 to study microbiology and received a bachelor's degree in 1982. Later, after layers of selection, Liu Chongzhi entered the Department of Cell and Developmental Biology of Harvard University in United States in 1983 to begin his master's studies. After rotating with a number of well-known mentors at Harvard University, she finally chose to study with Victor ·Ambrose, who was unknown in the industry at the time.
After that, during the 28 years she taught and researched at the University of Maryland, every time she returned to China, Liu Chongzhi could feel that her motherland had changed a lot and changed rapidly. "Shenzhen's support for high-tech is very strong, and when you come back here, you feel like everything is alive."
Since her work, she has also trained many Chinese students who have returned to China for development in United States. When she returns to Shenzhen University of Technology, she hopes to educate more Chinese students, and as a female researcher, she also hopes to influence more women in the next generation to pursue the path of scientific research.
"I feel like my life is like a circle, and now that I'm back in Guangdong, it's also fulfilling for me." Before officially returning to work in Shenzhen, Liu Chongzhi visited the Shenzhen Advanced Institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Shenzhen University of Technology under construction in April 2023, and was deeply impressed by the school's integration of science and education, the advantages of scientific research transformation and the new model of industrial transformation.
"There is a mature scientific research transformation system here, and with the support of the concept of doing scientific research upstairs and entrepreneurship downstairs, many successful scientific research transformation cases have been incubated." She hopes to bring her scientific research results back to Shenzhen for industrialization, and at the same time cultivate a group of outstanding scientific research talents for the motherland. In January this year, she officially joined the School of Synthetic Biology at Shenzhen University of Technology.
As an internationally renowned expert in developmental biology and a leader in the field of strawberry molecular genetics and fruit development, Liu Chongzhi is now a distinguished professor at the School of Synthetic Biology at Shenzhen University of Technology, and in the future, she will be deeply involved in the construction of the Future Agriculture Research Institute of Shenzhen University of Technology.
During her time in the United States, Liu Chongzhi mainly did basic research, and when she returned to Shenzhen, she hoped to turn basic scientific discoveries into applications, such as urban agriculture by building indoor agricultural factories. Currently, she is targeting strawberries.
Liu Chongzhi said proudly: "I have discovered how some very important genes of strawberries affect fruit development, plant height and structure, and our laboratory is a global leader in strawberry research!" Now, the strawberries planted by Liu Chongzhi back in Shenzhen have bloomed, and in the future, she will complete these "strawberry transformations" in the high-tech "greenhouse" built by the school.
On the one hand, she plans to change the color and flavor of strawberries through gene editing technology, and perhaps in the future, she will launch blue strawberries or purple strawberries, and through indoor three-dimensional planting, she can save land, water and fertilizer. On the other hand, she is also looking forward to adding more value to strawberries. "If farmers' strawberries want to be sold at a high price, they also need to have high nutritional value or antioxidant value, such as anti-aging functions and value."
In addition, Liu revealed that other projects she has been involved in at Shenzhen University of Technology have also been approved, which is a future agricultural project led by Professor Yang Zhenbiao of the School of Synthetic Biology at Shenzhen University of Technology, which aims to increase soybean production through gene editing technology and reduce the mainland's dependence on imported soybeans.
Written by: Nandu reporter Wu Manna Photo provided by the interviewee