Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Professor Ma was stunned as he had not expected that he would be rejected by this young scholar.
Even though a smile remained on his face, his eyes were cold.
With an unpleasant tone, Professor Ma said, “What? You think I’m old and can’t keep up with your thought process? Or do you think that I’m not good enough?”
Lu Zhou smiled and responded gently, “No, of course not. It’s just my personal habit.”
Professor Ma stared at Lu Zhou for a while before he laughed and said, “Ah, University of Jin Ling has some good talents. Okay then, it’s fine if you’re not interested. I won’t waste your time.”
The old man then walked away.
Wei Siyang was a bit embarrassed. He wanted to be friends with Lu Zhou but he did not want to offend his professor. After hesitating for a moment, he then left.
Lu Zhou was stunned.
He felt that the professor was a little unhappy.
That’s strange. Why did this professor care so much about my opinion?
What a weird guy.
When Lu Zhou saw Ma Changan’s back as he walked away, he did not know what had just happened.
…
A day later, the 12th National China Mathematics Society and 80th Anniversary Academic conference officially kicked off.
Inside the grand auditorium, people started to crowd on the red carpet.
Even though the conference had not even begun, people were already bragging left and right.
Domestic conferences were different from foreign conferences. The primary goal for domestic conferences was not for academic exchanges. Instead, it was an opportunity to make friends.
Unfortunately, before this conference even began, Lu Zhou had already offended a big name.
However, he felt that his rejection was nicely put and did not think too much into it.
Maybe next time he should lie and pretend that he did not make any progress on Polignac’s conjecture?
Lu Zhou, who went into the venue with Professor Lu, excused himself to go to the toilet. When he returned, Professor Lu was nowhere to be found.
He looked around in the venue and could not find Professor Lu, but he did find Yan Xinjue.
Yan Xinjue was chatting with a handsome man who wore glasses.
Just as Lu Zhou walked up and was about to say hello, Yan Xinjue was already one step ahead of him as he said, “Come, let me introduce you to Professor Yang Zhiguang, our outstanding alumni from University of Jin Ling!”
When Lu Zhou heard this name, he was stunned for a moment. He then said, “Professor Yang Zhiguang, nice to meet you!”
Yang Zhiguang was impressive. Lu Zhou saw his name on the University of Jin Ling’s Hall of Fame.
Graduated from the University of Jin Ling in 1985, he obtained a master’s degree from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1989 before he went to study at the University of Augsburg in Germany. After obtaining his Ph.D., he then did two years of research at the Technical University of Munich.
When he returned to China in 1994, he worked in the Institute of Mathematics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He was selected into the “Hundred Talents Program” of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and won major awards such as “Feng Kang Scientific Computing Award” and “National Natural Science Second Prize”.
Of course, the nuttiest part was that this guy reported for 45 minutes at the 2006 International Conference of Mathematicians in Spain.
He was the only speaker from China at that conference!
Yang Zhiguang was absolutely qualified to be a 2017 academician!
However, his research area was different than Lu Zhou. While Lu Zhou did not know much about what he studied, he knew that the professor was engaged in numerical analysis and scientific calculation.
His direction was not purely mathematical, but it was more to applied mathematics and was closely related to engineering.
Lu Zhou was not surprised to see him here.
What he did not expect was that Professor Yang Zhiguang looked so young. If Yan Xinjue did not introduce Lu Zhou to him, Lu Zhou would have thought that the guy was 30 years old. The truth was that Yang Zhiguang was already in his 50’s.
In comparison, Yan Xinjue who was only in his 30’s already had a receding hairline.
“Hello,” said Yang Zhiguang as he shook Lu Zhou’s hand. He said rather enthusiastically, “I was just talking about your glorious deeds. I didn’t expect to meet you so quickly. What an honor!”
Lu Zhou smiled and replied humbly, “What glorious deeds… Your research results have brought benefits to the entire country. My research is all theoretically, it’s not even worth mentioning!”
As a physicist, Yan Xinjue could not converse with these two.
Yang Zhiguang held Lu Zhou’s hand as said humbly, “Don’t be too modest, your calculation methods are of a textbook level. The entire country will be using them! Professor Liu of the Institute of Polymer Materials of the Chinese Academy of Sciences was very proud of your achievements! Every time I talked about you, he would praise your work. He said it has bridged the gap between materials science and mathematics as well as igniting the fire of stars in computational materials science. Not to mention, your work in number theory… Even international masters have praised you.”
F*ck me, this is way too exaggerated!
I just wrote one computational material thesis. What do you mean by bridging the gap?
Lu Zhou did not know what to say.
Fortunately, Professor Lu came over, and he was saved by the bell.
“Fine, stop bragging you two. I can’t listen to it anymore!”
When Professor Yang Zhiguang saw Professor Lu, he smiled. Embarrassed, he said, “What do you by bragging, I was telling the truth.”
Yang Zhiguang was in his 50’s, so he was still young compared to the 70-year-old Professor Lu.
Not to mention, Yang Zhiguang was once in Professor Lu’s physics class.
Their relationship was that of mentor and mentee.
As Professor Lu nodded with satisfaction, he said, “Your academician evaluation is coming up, right?”
Yang Zhiguang smiled and said, ‘Not sure, it’s all up to the organization.”
“Okay then. Our University of Jin Ling hasn’t produced much mathematics talent, and you’re the only one from the ’80s. As for the 2010s, it’ll depend on this guy,” said Professor Lu as he patted Lu Zhou’s shoulder. He then added, “You two should do your best. The future of this country depends on you young people.”
Yan Xinjue suddenly asked, “Boss, what about me?”
“You?” said Professor Lu. As he looked at him, he said, “You… You should also try your best.”
Yan Xinjue, “…?”
Lu Zhou nearly laughed out loud.
…
It was soon nine o’clock, and the opening ceremony of the conference officially began.
Professor Wang Shicheng of the Chinese Mathematical Society delivered an opening speech.
He was then followed by the chairman of the International Mathematical Union, Sen Chongwen, as well as Hergi Horton and the other international mathematicians. They all came to celebrate China Mathematics Society’s 80th birthday.
These scholars had been researching since the ’80s, and they came from all around the world.
After Professor Wen Lan announced the opening of the conference with a, “Always follow your heart, wherever it may lead you”, the conference erupted in applause.
The end of the opening ceremony was the highlight of the conference. Soon, it was the Loo-Keng Hua Mathematics Award and Shiing-Shen Chern Mathematics Award ceremony!
The former was aimed at professors over the age of 50 while the latter was aimed at young scholars under the age of 50. There were two candidates per award.
The prize money was only $100,000 yuan but the meaning was significant.
Especially the Shiing-Shen Chern Mathematics Award; it was considered a domestic Fields Medal.
Winners of the Loo-Keng Hua Mathematics Award were academicians Lin and Liu from the University of Sichuan. They were rewarded for their outstanding contributions in computational mathematics and topology.
Soon after, the most exciting moment came.
Professor Qiu Chengtong stood on the podium and smiled. He shook hands with Professor Wang Shicheng before he took over the microphone.
The Shiing-Shen Chern Mathematics Award young scholar award would be awarded by this old gentleman.
The applause gradually subsided.
The old man cleared his throat and said slowly, “The first winner is Professor Yang Zhiguang from the Institute of Mathematics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. His main research results are systematic research on the perfect matching layer method (PML) for wave scattering problems and the wave source transfer region splitting algorithm for high-frequency Helmholtz equations. He established a mathematical foundation for the famous Peaceman machine model in the engineering world…”
“The second award winner is…”
Professor Qiu flipped to the next page and adjusted his glasses before he announced it loudly.
“Lu Zhou!”