China’s high-tech: 10 trends in next 10 years

Editor’s Be aware: Tian Feng is a tech professional primarily based in Beijing who follows frontier applied sciences carefully. The article displays the creator’s opinions and never essentially the views of CGTN.

Main breakthroughs in scientific, engineering and industrial challenges are the driving forces behind the sustained improvement of human society. The world is present process once-in-a-century adjustments, and humanity is affected by pure disasters corresponding to floods, droughts and hurricanes, in addition to world challenges corresponding to anti-globalization commerce disruptions, employment difficulties and getting old populations. Solely a steady stream of scientific and technological innovation can deliver hope and route for the continued survival and improvement of humanity.

Primarily based on the scientific and technological breakthroughs China made in 2021, we will peek into the foremost improvement tendencies of China’s science and know-how over the following decade.

1. Earth simulator to foretell future crises

The Earth has a historical past of 4.6 billion years, whereas humanity has solely a brief historical past of about 50 million years. Scientists are exploring the usage of a “digital twin” of Earth to simulate the planet’s previous and current, in order to forecast the longer term paths of the pure world and human civilizations.

Final June, the Institute of Atmospheric Physics beneath the Chinese language Academy of Sciences (CAS) unveiled China’s first such scientific undertaking named the Earth System Science Numerical Simulator Facility, or “EarthLab.”

It will possibly simulate the bodily, chemical and organic evolution of the Earth’s environment, hydrosphere, cryosphere, lithosphere and biosphere by applied sciences together with high-performance computing, high-precision environmental simulation and massive information, in order to supply scientific assist for issues corresponding to pure catastrophe prevention and mitigation and combating local weather change.

Nations together with the U.S. and Japan have already constructed such Earth simulators, and “EarthLab” is corresponding to the Europe Union’s “Vacation spot Earth” initiative. The undertaking continues to be in its early improvement interval and can take greater than a decade to be upgraded. 

2. 3D printing to reinvent manufacturing

In China’s industrial improvement objectives for the following three to 5 years, additive manufacturing, often known as 3D printing, is a key know-how within the improvement technique of high-grade computerized numerical management (CNC) machine instruments and robots.

A Lengthy March-5B rocket launched in Could 2020 carried a 3D printer and realized 3D printing of fiber-reinforced composite components in area for the primary time. In 2021, China Aerospace Science and Business Company efficiently printed plane merchandise with advanced constructions, which considerably lowered the burden of plane.

Within the foreseeable future, 3D printing know-how can be used to fabricate merchandise starting from one thing as small as synthetic tooth to these as huge as interstellar rockets, and reinvent the entire manufacturing business for max price effectiveness and manufacturing effectivity. 

3. Cosmic sensing networks to look deep into the universe

Accompanying the event of area tourism is the rise of cosmic sensing networks.

For instance, China’s 5-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Radio Telescope (FAST), nicknamed the “Eye of Heaven,” has found a whole lot of pulsars from our photo voltaic system to the sting of the galaxy, laying the experimental basis for the longer term institution of “interstellar clocks” (pulsar timing arrays) and “interstellar navigation” (pulsar navigation system). FAST can be able to detecting gravitational waves and communication alerts from extraterrestrial civilizations (in the event that they exist).

China’s FAST has been open to world scientists since April 2021. It generates 15 petabytes of massive information (at a price of two gigabytes/second) yearly. It solely takes synthetic intelligence (AI) three days to course of a complete yr’s information to establish pulsars mechanically, with considerably increased effectivity and far better accuracy.

Within the coming a long time, China and different nations around the globe will construct extra “eyes” to look deep into area and launch extra deep area probes to determine sensing networks throughout the universe. With the large information collected by the sensing networks, scientists may even construct a “digital twin of the photo voltaic system” and a “digital twin of the galaxy,” thus attending to know extra about the actual universe. 

4. Photonic chips to empower ‘quantum computing superiority’

In 2019, photonic chips had been utilized in China’s photonic quantum pc prototype “Jiuzhang.” Jiuzhang (with 76 detected photons) can course of particular issues 100 trillion instances quicker than the world’s strongest supercomputer. An up to date model, Jiuzhang 2.0 (with 113 detected photons), which unveiled in 2021, is 100 instances quicker than Jiuzhang, and is programmable.

In December 2021, China unveiled its second-generation photonic chip, which options ultra-low latency, excessive throughput and excessive vitality effectivity.

In the meantime, in October 2021, China efficiently developed the 66-qubit programmable superconducting quantum pc prototype “Zuchongzhi 2.0,” which achieved two-dimensional programmable quantum stroll (as an alternative of random stroll).

Over the following decade, photonic chips can be steadily utilized in areas corresponding to autonomous driving, AR glasses, quantitative buying and selling, AI supercomputing information facilities and robots.

Quantum computing know-how is creating quickly in areas like quantum communications, quantum satellites and massive information processing, with numerous quantum industries beneath improvement.

5. AI to revolutionize scientific analysis

In scientific analysis, it is typically the final key on the ring that opens the door. AI with huge computing energy may help researchers take a look at all of the attainable keys earlier than an actual breakthrough could be made.

Typical analysis depends closely on handbook work, comes with excessive uncertainty and is often time-consuming. “AI Infrastructure” (AI information heart + analysis platform) can resolve these issues, endeavor the fundamental analysis in areas corresponding to new vitality, new meals, new supplies and new medicines and releasing precious analysis manpower from the tedious work of repeated experiments.

For instance, Chinese language firm Sensetime makes use of AI to mine information on protein interactions, reactions to most cancers medicine and gene mutation predictions primarily based on pathological picture.

The brand new AI information heart inbuilt Shanghai is the most important AI computing platform in Asia, with a computing energy of three,740 petaflops.

AI is revolutionizing analysis and improvement in numerous areas and can contribute to a slew of recent tech breakthroughs together with automated driving, new medicine to lengthen life expectancy, synthetic meat to feed the folks and managed nuclear fusion vitality to assist interstellar voyages.

6. AR glasses and the ‘period of ubiquitous screens’

Within the subsequent 5 years, cellphones will not be a necessity for folks, as we are going to enter the “period of ubiquitous screens” with augmented actuality (AR) glasses, wherein screens are all over the place and the whole lot can work together with one another. Within the metaverse we enter by AR glasses, there can be new-generation functions corresponding to area scanning and engines like google, digital twin factories, hospitals and communities, in addition to digital human assistants.

7. ‘Synthetic solar’ guarantees to unravel vitality disaster

Inside 200 years, the worldwide oil and pure fuel sources can be exhausted. The carbon emission from fossil energies has already prompted frequent excessive climate disasters worldwide. Subsequently, nations are investing big sums in clear energies corresponding to wind energy, photovoltaics, nuclear energy and hydropower.

Practically all of the energies discovered on Earth originated from the solar, and scientists are creating “artificial suns” (managed nuclear fusion reactors) as the final word vitality answer. A tool designed to permit managed nuclear fusion reactions to occur is known as Tokamac, which makes use of a robust magnetic discipline to restrict the recent plasma within the form of a torus.

China’s Experimental Superior Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) in Hefei, capital of east China’s Anhui Province, has simply set a new world record after working on the temperature of 70 million levels Celsius for so long as 1,056 seconds (over 17 minutes), laying “a stable scientific and experimental basis towards the working of a fusion reactor,” in response to the scientist answerable for the experiment.

Sooner or later, nuclear fusion vitality may even energy humanity’s long-distance travels to area.

8. From carbon dioxide to synthetic meals

Information from the United Nations World Meals Program confirmed that 2.37 billion folks around the globe didn’t have sufficient meals in 2020.

In September 2021, Chinese language scientists grew to become the primary on this planet to develop a synthetic technique of synthesizing starch from carbon dioxide (CO2).

The brand new strategy by the Tianjin Institute of Industrial Biotechnology of the CAS makes it attainable to change starch manufacturing from conventional agricultural planting to industrial manufacturing, which presents a brand new risk of creating synthetic meals sooner or later.

Theoretically, given sufficient vitality provide, primarily based on the present technical parameters, the annual manufacturing capability of starch in a 1-cubic-meter bioreactor equals the annual yield of starch from one-third of a hectare of corn, in response to the crew.

If the general price of the system could be lowered to a degree economically comparable with agricultural planting sooner or later, it’s anticipated to save lots of greater than 90 % of arable land and freshwater, in response to the researchers.

And the brand new strategy may even assist obtain carbon neutrality and fight world warming. 

9. New vitality autos and inexperienced hydrogen manufacturing

The transportation business is the third largest supply of greenhouse fuel emissions on this planet, and new vitality transition of transportation autos is important for the carbon neutrality objective.

Within the close to future, not solely vehicles, but in addition ships and planes can be fueled by quite a lot of new energies corresponding to electrical energy, hydrogen and pure fuel. Amongst them, the hydrogen gas cell has some great benefits of lengthy vary and quick refueling time.

In September 2021, a megawatt-level hydrogen manufacturing system utilizing proton alternate membrane (PEM) water electrolysis know-how, developed by the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics beneath the CAS, realized full capability operation, laying the technical basis for the large-scale utilization of inexperienced hydrogen vitality.

Sooner or later, there can be extra hydrogen gas vehicles, ships and planes, which can grow to be necessary dietary supplements for electrical transportation autos.

10. Ubiquitous computing

After greater than a decade’s improvement of excessive applied sciences, robots geared up with chips as “brains,” sensors as “eyes” and “noses,” robotic palms, and algorithms with the appropriate ethics can handle the work within the bodily world, whereas folks’s minds can marvel freely within the metaverse.

Typically, China within the subsequent decade will grow to be a world science and know-how hub, a expertise hotspot and an exporter of high-tech.