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China must enable scientists to think big and long term to keep top talent, ‘maths Nobel Prize’ winner says
- Yau Shing-Tung, who went from Harvard to Tsinghua last year, says researchers must be allowed to pursue truth rather than just grants
- Some of the methods used to determine rewards are outdated and limited, he says
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Ling Xinin Beijing
A leading mathematician who left the United States for a job in China last year has urged authorities to change the way they reward researchers or risk losing top talent.
Chinese-American Yau Shing-Tung, who became a full-time professor at Tsinghua University in Beijing in 2022, said on Friday that China must value cutting-edge and substantive research to inspire researchers to solve major, long-standing scientific problems, the Shanghai Observer reported.
In a talk at Shanghai’s Fudan University on the present and future of maths in the country, Yau said: “More and more young academics choose to have a career back in China, and they are as brilliant as their peers in Europe and the US.
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“However, they face a major problem: do they do research to pursue their own interest and truth, or do they do it to win grants and certain ‘hats’ by catering to the preference of some reviewers?”
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Yau, who is known for his work on differential geometry, said that in China most decisions on academic awards, honours, and promotions were made by experts within the country.
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