Chinese scientists awarded for sci-tech innovation and leadership in frontier research

Twenty-two Chinese scientists were honored with the 2026 Tan Kah Kee Science Award and the Tan Kah Kee Young Scientist Award in Beijing on Thursday, recognizing their significant contributions to original innovation in science and technology and their leadership in international frontier research.

The Tan Kah Kee Science Award, named after the patriotic overseas Chinese leader Tan Kah Kee, was established in 1988. In 2010, the Tan Kah Kee Young Scientist Award was introduced to honor young talents under the age of 40. To date, these awards have been granted to 182 scientists.

Wang Keqiang, vice-president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, extended congratulations to the award recipients. He said these awards highlight China's significant accomplishments in scientific and technological innovation and strategic planning, while also establishing a clear direction to support original innovation.

"This year's awards are not only granted to research of significant scientific and technological value but also reflect the conscious commitment of scientists to serving national strategies," Wang said, noting that the awards cover critical strategic areas including semiconductors, new materials, and quantum computing.

Zhang Tao, a CAS academician and a professor at the CAS' Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, was awarded for leading his team in pioneering single-atom catalysis. This breakthrough overcame the bottleneck of low metal atom utilization efficiency in traditional nanoscale catalysts, achieving a theoretical 100 percent utilization rate and enabling precise control over catalytic processes.

"Since its introduction in 2011, the concept has gained significant international influence, emerging as a frontier research area in global chemistry. Thousands of research teams from more than 100 countries and regions have engaged in this field, with more than 5,000 publications reported in 2025 alone," Zhang said.

He attributed the breakthrough achievement to China's sustained and intensive investment in fundamental research. Additionally, the quantitative accumulation of knowledge, built upon the work of predecessors and the team's decades-long efforts, led to qualitative breakthroughs.

Pan Qingsong, a professor at the CAS' Institute of Metal Research, was recognized for his pioneering strategy of spatially unit ordering in metallic materials, which achieves synergistic optimization of strength, ductility, and fatigue resistance through tailor-designing gradient dislocation structure.

"Metallic materials serve as a cornerstone of human civilization's development. From aerospace and terrestrial engineering to deep-sea exploration, extreme environments across domains rely on high-performance metallic materials," Pan said, noting a fundamental trade-off between strength and toughness.

He emphasized that young scientists must dare to tackle critical challenges like this, advancing from fundamental theoretical breakthroughs to innovative design and full-cycle process fabrication, thereby making tangible contributions to national scientific and technological self-reliance.

Wang Zhen, a professor at Northwestern Polytechnical University who was awarded for his pioneering contributions in the theory of game intelligence and its applications in artificial intelligence, echoed Pan's views. He emphasized that achieving scientific and technological self-reliance requires young researchers to exhibit audacity in creating new research paradigms, transitioning from single-point advancements to comprehensive innovation ecosystems.

Wang highlighted the original analytical framework developed by his team over 15 years, which now serves as an indispensable tool for ongoing systematic studies. This infrastructure supports sustained development and research, fulfilling a crucial need for the country.

In rapidly evolving fields such as AI and cyberspace security, establishing an interdisciplinary collaborative innovation framework is crucial.

"By attracting young researchers of diverse academic backgrounds into research groups, we can achieve exponential improvements in the efficiency of technological innovation," he said.