BEIJING, Feb. 15 (Xinhua) -- As millions of families in China come together to celebrate the Lunar New Year, countless scientists and engineers are still hard at work in their laboratories, the Gobi Desert, freezing observation stations, and on engineering sites.
They're pushing forward with crucial projects that will shape the future of energy, materials, and space missions.
AI-DRIVEN REVOLUTION IN NEW MATERIALS
At the State Key Laboratory of Precision and Intelligent Chemistry at the University of Science and Technology of China, several AI robots autonomously design experimental protocols and conduct experiments around the clock.
This laboratory led the development of international standards for intelligent chemistry software and hardware, driving a paradigm shift toward data-driven chemical research.
Utilizing the lab's platform, first-year PhD student Fang Tiancheng has successfully developed a novel thermal insulation material, breaking through the limits of traditional porous insulators.
The innovative material overcame the 2,000 degrees Celsius threshold for ultra-thin materials isolating the human body from atmospheric conditions. This milestone represents a significant advancement in thermodynamics and has already generated several hundred million yuan in economic value through its associated products.
Fang said he would negotiate cooperation with multiple enterprises and continue to carry out research on new materials using this platform during the new year.
EXPERIMENTAL REACTOR DEEP IN DESERT
In the Gobi Desert in northwest China's Gansu Province, researchers and engineers keep an experimental reactor for thorium-uranium fuel conversion in stable operation.
The experimental Thorium Molten Salt Reactor (TMSR), built by the Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics (SINAP) of the Chinese Academy of Science (CAS) in collaboration with other Chinese institutions, successfully achieved the first-ever thorium to uranium nuclear fuel conversion in 2025, making it the world's only currently operational molten salt reactor utilizing thorium-based fuel.
This achievement was selected among China's top 10 scientific achievements of 2025 by academicians of the CAS and the Chinese Academy of Engineering recently.
According to Zou Yang, director of the Thorium-based Nuclear Energy Research Center at the institute, this achievement demonstrates the technological feasibility of utilizing thorium resources in molten salt reactor nuclear energy systems. It provides essential technical support for China's large-scale use of thorium resources and the development of advanced nuclear energy technology for the future.
"This year, we plan to keep the 2 megawatt liquid-fueled thorium-based molten salt experimental reactor in stable operation and continue experimental research after adding thorium," Zou said.
FUTURE NUCLEAR ENERGY
In Huizhou, south China's Guangdong Province, He Yuan, deputy director of the Institute of Modern Physics of CAS, led his team stationed at the construction site of the China initiative Accelerator Driven System (CiADS).
The team installed and commissioned key equipment to ensure the development of the world's first accelerator-driven advanced nuclear energy system progresses on schedule.
He explained that uranium fission releases 2.7 million times more energy than burning an equivalent mass of coal. However, nuclear energy development has long faced two major bottlenecks: less than 1 percent of natural uranium resources are directly usable as nuclear fuel, and the safe management of large volumes of nuclear waste remains a pressing challenge.
CiADS began construction in July 2021 and is scheduled for completion by the end of 2027. According to He, its aim is to advance technologies for the safe disposal of nuclear waste and the efficient breeding of nuclear fuel.
These technologies have the potential to increase uranium utilization efficiency to over 90 percent, maximizing resource efficiency while minimizing waste in nuclear fission energy, thereby offering a promising pathway for nuclear energy to become a green and stable energy source, He added.
FRIGID FRONTIER
At the remote sensing satellite ground station in Mohe, China's northernmost city in northeastern Heilongjiang Province, temperatures can plunge to minus 53 degrees Celsius in winter, with over seven months of ice-bound conditions each year.
This is the first Spring Festival since the station started running. Shi Shengpu, head of the station, led his team in braving the extreme cold to clear snow from antennas, inspect equipment, and collect operational parameters, accumulating invaluable data for system stability under harsh conditions.
Built by the Aerospace Information Research Institute of CAS, the station leverages its high-latitude geographic advantage to increase daily data reception time for polar-orbiting satellites by over 20 percent. It currently handles data reception tasks for 25 land observation satellites.
The completion of the Mohe station has significantly enhanced China's observation capabilities for polar and high-latitude regions, achieving improvements in satellite data acquisition efficiency and coverage. This is of great significance to many fields such as land surveying and mapping, environmental protection, meteorological forecasting and disaster monitoring, Shi said. ■
