Peidong Yang: cultivating ground-breaking research in China

Opened in September 2013, ShanghaiTech University is a small-scale research university jointly established by Shanghai Municipal Government and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. As the founding dean of the newly launched School of Physical Science and Technology (SPST) of ShanghaiTech, Peidong Yang has been busy in drawing up the roadmap, initiating new programs and recruiting faculty members over the past two years. His mission at SPST is to make breakthroughs in interdisciplinary areas and promote cutting-edge original research, which he refers to as research 'from 0 to 1'. In a recent interview with NSR, Yang pointed out that many research programs in China are incremental or just simple optimization of ground-breaking work by others, leading to duplication and fragmentation of research programs. And lack of differentiation and signature contribution is a major problem for the science community in China. He hopes to wriggle out of this situation through training the young generation to be independent and innovative.

accelerate the development of our school if we could bring them in. Unfortunately, these potential candidates typically have family matters to take care of. For example many of them have teenage kids in middle school, it is difficult for them to relocate for these family reasons. During last three years we have tried very hard to attract several senior scientists-few worked out, although scientists with their children in college were more likely to go back to China. We are still figuring out ways to solve this urgent issue. NSR: How many faculty members are there in SPST? Yang: We now have more than 30 tenure-track members, and recruit at a pace of about 10-15 scientists every year. We expect to have 150 members when SPST is at its steady state operation, so there is still room for attracting more talents. We want to take it slow and steady, and attract the best and brightest. In our mind, when the number of faculties reaches 150, the number of undergraduates would be roughly 200 every year, which is really ideal for undergraduate education. NSR: How do you train the students? Are there collaboration between ShanghaiTech and US universities? Yang: Yes. After the university was founded, ShanghaiTech has been keeping close cooperation in research and teaching with Berkeley, MIT and UC Chicago and several other universities. We once used the curriculum from Berkeley and Caltech to teach our students, which did not work well initially. The main reason, I think, is that the background of our undergraduates is different from that of students in the US. We then redesigned and adjusted our curriculum quickly in response to this situation. Being a small-scale university, we can change more easily.

CHOICE OF RESEARCH DIRECTION
NSR: How will SPST be different from US universities in its research programs? Yang: In ShanghaiTech, there are three major schools (SPST SIST, SLST), but no traditional departments like chemistry and physics. By encouraging interdisciplinary approach, the university aims to conduct original and innovative research. Furthermore, students trained in SPST will have advantages to do interdisciplinary research when they start their career.
Peidong Yang, talking with undergraduates at ShanghaiTech University on 30 September 2014 (Courtesy of SPST ).
Many research programs in China are incremental or just simple optimization of ground-breaking work by others, leading to duplication and fragmentation of research programs.
-Peidong Yang Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility (SSRF) is another unique research infrastructure for SPST, which would enable characterization of material structure and function under realistic experimental conditions. Such beamline research capacity will largely enhance our ability to understand and design nextgeneration energy materials.
In fact, utilizing beamline in material research is now a global research frontier and many leading groups at SLAC and LBL are doing exactly that. SSRF is the most advanced synchrotrons in China and is being upgraded constantly. SPST will have the ability and resources to compete in this direction. NSR: In addition to utilization of the beamline, what are the main research directions of SPST in future? Yang: Our research focuses on materials, energy and environment. We have set up three research divisions: system materials, photon and condensed matter, and material-biology. We would like to open up new directions at the conjunction of different disciplines, to provide innovative solution to energy and environment problems and to become the hub of inspiring original ideas and research. NSR: For these research directions, do you have any specific requirement for building the faculty? Yang: Faculty members are clustered according to targets and requirements of the research division. For example, in photon and condensed matter unit, some scientists have background of condensed matter physics and others have background of beamline or photonics; and there are senior scientists and also junior ones. Actually each of the research divisions is interdisciplinary, and scientists with different background inside and outside the division need to closely collaborate. NSR: Take material-biology for example, what do you like to work on? Yang: Material-biology is actually a discipline emerged at the interface of material and biology. For example, we published a paper earlier this year in Science which deals with solar energy transfer and storage through functional composite system of semiconductor and bacteria. When semiconductor precipitated on the surface of non-photosynthesis bacteria, the semiconductor acquired energy from light, and feeds electrons to the bacteria, then the photosynthetic function will initiate, and the remarkable process of artificial photosynthesis will continue to produce acetate. It is a promising way to help us meet the energy challenges. It is this sort of research we are going to encourage at SPST. NSR: Materials-biology interface is also a hot topic for biologists. Microbes respond to environment change through releasing 536 Natl Sci Rev, 2016, Vol. 3, No. 4 INTERVIEW different chemicals, further to affect the physiology of their host. Biologists are studying how endogenous microbiota would alter the inner environment of human body. And through regulating the microbiota, scientists may treat some human diseases. Yang: That is interesting! Microbiomes would also be meaningful for energy research; we are typically dealing with single strain of bacteria at this moment. In the future we should examine the consortium of bacteria.

INDEPENDENCE AND COLLABORATION
NSR: You have mentioned that, young scientists should be independent, and also should be cooperative. How to balance the independence and collaboration? Evaluation system in China sometimes inclines to stress on independent contribution rather than cooperation. Yang: In my point of view, independence and collaboration are not incompatible, but prerequisites of each other. Independence means a researcher must have his or her expertise in a certain field, and he or she has original ideas. Only in this way, their contribution in collaborative work would be unique and discernible. Our young scientists should have the freedom to explore and dare to lead! NSR: How do you evaluate the technicians who master skills like organic synthesis that are essential in research projects? Yang: We should take different situations into consideration. If he/she is just a technician without own ideas, I do not think he/she reaches the standard of a PI, but if he/she has original achievement in synthetic field, and could initiate cooperation with others, then he/she could be a PI. NSR: Collaboration is not well encouraged nowadays in China, and counting research papers and impact factor is a common practice to evaluate talents. Yang: Scientific evaluation mechanism is typically formulated and enacted by bureaucrats not by professionals of scientific community in China. In SPST, when we evaluate our young faculties, our science committee would extensively evaluate the research experience, contribution and potential of a candidate to give a fair and objective assessment.
It is unfortunate that, many universities in China still depend on the existing national evaluation system to recruit their faculties. Once a scientist gets 'talent plan' support, universities would compete for the 'talents'. On the other hand, 'counting papers and impact factor' method makes scientists eager for quick success, leading to duplication and fragmentation. Lacking of differentiation or signature contribution in research is a major problem in China: scientists often have similar expertise, and there is no incentive and need to collaborate.
I have been the associate editor of Journal of American Chemical Society (JACS) for nearly 15 years: number of papers from scientists of China increases sharply, from 10-20 papers to several hundreds annually, while the total number published in JACS per year keeps steady, about 2000. It is good to see that we publish more and more papers in renowned journals like JACS, but according to my observation, most of the papers are still quite incremental.
Our young scientists should have the freedom to explore and dare to lead! -Peidong Yang NSR: China is now participating more deeply in global research cooperation. How do you think China could take lead in a collaborative project? Yang: The most important thing is to have core competence: those have significant intellectual contribution to the original idea would have their voice; researchers satisfied with incremental work cannot lead. When there are more and more scientists doing ground-breaking research in China, the Chinese scientific community will then likely to lead.

LEAVE A TRAIL
NSR: You have always been a pioneer in new research directions in nanomaterials, such as semiconducting nanowires, nanowire lasers and artificial photosynthesis. What is the motivation for your choice? Yang: Maybe one of the reasons is that, I do not want to be a 'one of the thousand' in a well-developed field established by others, and I would like to do something very different from others, although risk of failure is also much higher. American philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson once said 'Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.' When I was a PhD candidate in Charles Lieber's Laboratory, carbon nanotube and fullerene were fashionable at that time. I decided to choose a new direction, nanowire, at the time very few paid attention to that topic. After about five years, we made excellent progress and opened up a new field and nanowire became a fashion. When I started my independent career at Berkeley, I again reset myself and chose a new path to move on. NSR: Having idea is crucial, but supportive research ecosystem is also essential for ground-breaking research. The US is a positive example. Yang: Yes. In fact, for Chinese scientists, research resources including funding and facilities have been improving greatly these years. It is the perfect time for scientists to choose less popular but important research directions, and do some 'from 0 to 1' work, which would probably gain significant return in the long run.
If we see the innovation process as a relay race of 100 meters, and we divide it into 3 parts: from 0 to 1, from 1 to 99, and from 99 to 100. The first part should be undertaken by universities and research institutes, and the second part should be shouldered by engineers largely in companies or university-company allies, and the third part should be empowered by markets.
The type of 'from 0 to 1' research is the origin of new knowledge and has nothing to do with commercialization; it is pure science, driven by curiosity of scientists. The type of 'from 1 to It is the perfect time for scientists to choose less popular but important research directions, and do some "from 0 to 1" work, which would probably gain significant return in the long run.
-Peidong Yang 99' research is a process optimization, which is now very popular in China. If we take a look of the battery research field, most of the work belongs to 'from 1 to 99'. Although device/process optimization is important and essential, without original research, we will not be able to lead. NSR: Choosing 'from 0 to 1' type of research would require adventure spirit for a scientist.
Yang: Right. You should pinpoint the important problems in your research field, and then explore the unexplored territory. NSR: Are you satisfied with the development speed of your material school? And do you think it would become a top research institute in the world in 5-10 years? Yang: I am happy with our achievement so far. We have brilliant young scientists and hope they would become mature and experienced in six years, the time when they get their tenure. I am very confident there will be some outstanding scientists in our school, who will be leading scientists in a certain field. But it takes much longer to build a top ranked institute, 5-10 years seems insufficient to fulfill the mission.
Mu-ming Poo is the Director of CAS Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, and Executive Associate Editor of NSR, and Ling Wang is a science news reporter based in Beijing.