Academician Li's envy wasn't unreasonable.
In fact, there was probably no one in the China academic community that wasn't envious of Lu Zhou.
He had the halo of a Nobel Prize winner in Fields, and he was elected as an academician of two academies. He only had to say a few hundred billion yuan worth of projects, and tens of thousands of useless researchers would have to work for him.
And he, who had accomplished all of this, was not even thirty years old yet …
For countless people, his achievements had basically marked the pinnacle of being a scholar.
However, there were some things that couldn't be obtained through envy.
Academician Li Qingquan was envious, but he also admired Professor Lu. The earth-shattering achievements that Professor Lu had made after returning to China were things that most people would never be able to accomplish in their lifetime.
For him to be able to do all this, he was indeed worthy of being so highly regarded.
At the very least, compared to those bureaucrat-type scholars who sat in their positions without doing anything, he was much better.
Just as the State Administration for National Defense conference on the lunar mass projector project was coming to an end, the initiator of the project, Lu Zhou, had already left Beijing and returned to Jinling.
So far, the work of the Lunar Orbit Committee was basically on the right track. The important work had basically been arranged, and Lu Zhou finally had some time to shift some of his attention from the Lunar Orbit Committee to Jin Ling University.
Coupled with his graduation thesis, he basically came to the mathematics department office for the next few days.
"… Yesterday, I received a reply from the editorial department of International Materials-Reviews. Congratulations, your graduation thesis has been successfully published."
Han Mengqi stood in front of Lu Zhou's desk and had a relaxed expression on her face. She sighed in relief.
She had been preparing for at least half a year for this graduation thesis. Now that the rock that had been hanging in her heart had finally fallen to the ground, at least until next summer, she would be able to relax a little.
Lu Zhou looked at Han Mengqi, who was breathing a sigh of relief.
"Don't be so relieved yet, have you thought about what you want to do after graduation?"
Hearing this question, Han Mengqi awkwardly touched the back of her head, then shook her head and hesitantly said, "I … haven't thought about it yet."
"Try to think about it as soon as possible." Lu Zhou looked at her and said seriously, "If you plan on doing a PhD, you can start preparing in the first half of this year. If you want to find a job, you have to find an internship in the first half of the semester. If there's any place you want to go, I can write a recommendation letter for you. "
Han Mengqi stared at her toes and said, "Professor, can I ask a question?"
Lu Zhou smiled and said, "Go ahead. Answering students' graduation inquiries is also part of my job."
"What does it feel like to study for a PhD?"
"What kind of feeling? This question is a bit abstract, "Lu Zhou thought for a moment and said," How should I describe it … Actually, it's probably the same as what you do every day, right? The only difference is probably in their mentality. "
"Mentality?" Han Mengqi tilted her head and asked curiously, "Can you be more specific?"
Lu Zhou: "Simply put, a PhD and a master's degree are both scientific research. The only difference is that the main task of a master's degree is to skillfully use some scientific research tools, such as graphic-models, Markov chains, etc., and use these tools to solve some small problems encountered in scientific research. At this stage, new problems and tools are usually proposed by the supervisor, and the master's degree is responsible for thinking of specific solutions. "
"As for the PhD stage …" Lu Zhou paused for a second and recalled how he spent his PhD stage. He then said, "The main task of a PhD is to use new tools to solve new problems. As for the so-called new problems, it can be proposed by the supervisor or by the student themselves. Usually, at this stage, students would already have the ability to ask questions, and they would also be able to come up with ideas that others would not have thought of. It is also from this stage that you can be considered to be truly independent in scientific research … Are you listening? "
"Ah …"
Lu Zhou's voice reminded Han Mengqi, who was in a daze, to suddenly come back to her senses.
She noticed that Lu Zhou was looking at her, and she realized that she was distracted. She suddenly blushed and scratched her head. She bowed her head and apologized. "Sorry … I was a little distracted."
Lu Zhou said in a relaxed tone, "It's fine, I can see that you have something on your mind. When you are troubled by something and can't make a decision, even I get distracted, so there's no need to apologize. "
Han Mengqi carefully asked, "Are you also troubled by something?"
Lu Zhou, who was sitting behind his desk, went silent for a while. He didn't know how to answer this question.
However, after thinking for a bit, he replied in a slightly vague tone.
"Of course, as long as you are a person, you will encounter problems that are beyond your ability. Even I can't be sure that every choice I make is the best one. There are even some things that I can't give a good solution to. "
She didn't know why, but she suddenly cared about what Lu Zhou was talking about.
Han Mengqi blinked her eyes and tried to muster up the courage to speak.
"Can I ask what kind of problem it is?"
"Some personal problems …" Lu Zhou coughed and forcibly changed the topic. "Back to the topic, you are talented in scientific research. If you want to continue on the academic road, I recommend you continue to choose computational materials science. Especially the Berry phase and topology effect in phonons, the development of 3D topology materials, and hydrogen storage materials. These three fields are quite popular and relatively easy to produce results. "
The role of computational materials science was mainly to establish predictable or descriptive models to help study the internal mechanism of materials and reduce the time and cost of new material development.
Ten years ago, this would still be considered a new discipline, but now, this discipline has basically been developed and matured. Especially after the 2018 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, many research institutes opened related research departments. Generally, strong materials science research teams would also retain a PhD student proficient in computational materials science in the project team. Therefore, there was no shortage of job opportunities.
As for the easier to produce results …
Actually, that was only relative to Lu Zhou's laboratory.
The Jinling Institute for Advanced Study was a strong experimental institution in the field of aerospace materials, carbon materials, and new energy. Many academic journals in this field had even been "contracted" by the theses produced by the Institute. Therefore, for the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study, it was naturally very easy to produce results in this field.
Lu Zhou looked at Han Mengqi, who was silent for a long time. He twirled the pen in his hand and spoke.
"What do you think?"
"I think …"
Han Mengqi gently bit her lips and pondered for a long time.
Finally, she seemed to have made up her mind. She suddenly raised her head and spoke in a firm tone.
"I want … to study mathematics with you!"
Lu Zhou: "…?"
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