In 2005, Mr. Qian Xuesen said when he was recuperating in the hospital: "Now China has not fully developed, an important reason is that no university can run schools in accordance with the model of cultivating scientific and technological invention and creation talents, there is no unique innovative thing, and it is always 'risking' outstanding talents." This is a big problem. ”
This is the famous "Qian Xuesen's Question".
It has been 16 years since the question raised by Mr. Qian, and we still have many places that are "stuck neck", such as mobile phone chips.
Qian Xuesen's ability to ask such questions proves his foresight and keen insight as a scientific and technological worker.
In September 1935, Qian Xuesen and 20 other students who stayed in the United States on public expense traveled from Shanghai to Seattle, the United States, aboard the President Jackson ship. At that time, the United States was also one of the "Eight-Power Coalition" and returned about 10 million US dollars in reparations, accounting for about one-fifth of its total. This amount of reparations is mainly used for Education and Cultural Undertakings in China. A large number of outstanding talents have studied in the United States, which has benefited Chinese a lot. Some of them returned to China and became leaders in all walks of life. They had Mei Yiqi, Hu Shi, Zhao Yuanren, Jin Yuelin, Hou Debang, Yang Zhenning, and Qian Xuesen was one of them.
After obtaining a master's degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a top american polytechnic university, Xuesen Qian studied for a doctorate under professor von Carmen, the world's top rocket expert. In 1939, he received his Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology. In August, he published a paper entitled "Two-Dimensional Sonic Flow of Compressible Fluids" to elucidate the pressure correction formula, which was later called the Money-Carmen formula. In 1943, he became an associate professor at the California Institute of Technology.
In 1944, Qian Xuesen resigned from the position of jet team leader at the California Institute of Technology and followed his teacher von Carmen Washington to the War Department's Scientific Advisory Group, at this time Qian Xuesen was already a world-renowned rocket expert.
After Germany's defeat in 1945, Qian Xuesen was given a unique opportunity to further enrich his rocket knowledge. The reason why the US military is in a hurry to build rockets is because it has heard about the large-scale rocket launch base that Germany is building, and this plan ended with Germany's defeat. But Qian Xuesen, as a representative of U.S. military experts and an investigation team, was given the opportunity to go to Germany.
In Germany, Qian Xuesen obtained a test base to personally observe the German army, asked The top German rocket experts, this trip made Qian Xuesen the world's top rocket experts, and then he led the Us space rocket research and designed the Mach 12 hypersonic rocket aircraft, that is, the "Qian Xuesen Ballistic".
Later, McCarthyism prevailed in the United States, and Qian Xuesen was once in prison. After five years of house arrest, he hired a lawyer to defend himself, while the president of the United States relaxed that Qian Xuesen's knowledge was behind the times. In 1955 he finally returned home.
Some people say that Qian Xuesen once tried to become a U.S. citizen and failed, but there seems to be no definite evidence to prove it.
After returning to China, Qian Xuesen became a leading figure in China's space rockets, and in 1960 the DF-1 short-range ballistic missile (surface-to-ground) was successfully launched. In 1965, the artificial satellite project began to be implemented. In April 1970, China's first artificial satellite "Dongfanghong I" was successfully launched.
As the winner of two bombs and one star. Mr. Qian is naturally in his professional field, other areas may not be very good, so it is normal, people's energy is limited, in one aspect to achieve the ultimate is enough.
For example, in 58 years, he said: The ultimate limit of agricultural production depends on the sunlight energy per unit area per year, assuming that the efficiency of plant photosynthesis of 30% can be achieved, and rice can even reach "more than 20 times that of 2000 pounds".
In 1980, he supported the study of the specific functions of the human body, he said: "The specific functions of the human body are true, not false; there are fakes, there are deceitful, but that is not the specific functions of the human body." "Maybe one day we will find out that people really have special functions, because the human body is very wonderful." There are still many unsolved mysteries.
Mr. Qian Xuesen is a scientist, the times and opportunities have created unique conditions for him, and he himself is also gifted. In his later years, deep questioning was also the conscience of Qian Xuesen as a scientist, after all, he really knew where we were and where we needed to make progress.