Twenty-two Chinese scientists have been honored with the 2026 Tan Kah Kee Science Award and the Tan Kah Kee Young Scientist Award in Beijing on Thursday, recognizing their vital contributions to authentic innovation in science and expertise and their leadership in worldwide frontier research.
The Tan Kah Kee Science Award, named after the patriotic abroad Chinese chief Tan Kah Kee, was established in 1988. In 2010, the Tan Kah Kee Young Scientist Award was launched to honor younger abilities beneath the age of 40. To date, these awards have been granted to 182 scientists.
Wang Keqiang, vice-president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, prolonged congratulations to the award recipients. He mentioned these awards spotlight China”s vital accomplishments in scientific and technological innovation and strategic planning, whereas additionally establishing a transparent course to help authentic 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 mentioned, noting that the awards cowl important strategic areas together with semiconductors, new supplies, and quantum computing.
Zhang Tao, a CAS academician and a professor on the CAS’ Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, was awarded for main his staff in pioneering single-atom catalysis. This breakthrough overcame the bottleneck of low steel atom utilization effectivity in conventional nanoscale catalysts, reaching a theoretical one hundred pc utilization charge and enabling exact management 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 mentioned.
He attributed the breakthrough achievement to China’s sustained and intensive funding in elementary research. Additionally, the quantitative accumulation of data, constructed upon the work of predecessors and the staff’s decades-long efforts, led to qualitative breakthroughs.
Pan Qingsong, a professor on the CAS’ Institute of Metal Research, was acknowledged for his pioneering technique of spatially unit ordering in metallic supplies, which achieves synergistic optimization of power, ductility, and fatigue resistance by way of tailor-designing gradient dislocation construction.
“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 mentioned, noting a elementary trade-off between power and toughness.
He emphasised that younger scientists should dare to sort out important challenges like this, advancing from elementary theoretical breakthroughs to progressive design and full-cycle course of fabrication, thereby making tangible contributions to nationwide scientific and technological self-reliance.
Wang Zhen, a professor at Northwestern Polytechnical University who was awarded for his pioneering contributions in the speculation of recreation intelligence and its purposes in synthetic intelligence, echoed Pan’s views. He emphasised that reaching scientific and technological self-reliance requires younger researchers to exhibit audacity in creating new research paradigms, transitioning from single-point developments to complete innovation ecosystems.
Wang highlighted the unique analytical framework developed by his staff over 15 years, which now serves as an indispensable device for ongoing systematic research. This infrastructure helps sustained growth and research, fulfilling an important want for the nation.
In quickly evolving fields reminiscent of AI and our on-line world safety, establishing an interdisciplinary collaborative innovation framework is essential.
“By attracting young researchers of diverse academic backgrounds into research groups, we can achieve exponential improvements in the efficiency of technological innovation,” he mentioned.