NOVEL WEB Chapter 510 Isn't this solved?
"Is that all?" Academician Xu's pupils suddenly doubled in size. They originally thought that the documents following were just some data or supplementary materials about Zhang Menglong's cancer targeting treatment. He could never have imagined that those were actually the research proposals for the other 157 projects this year!
"May I take a look?"
"Of course," Zhang Menglong said with a smile, "but you can't back out after you've seen it!"
"If the quality of your stuff is the same as this one, not to mention giving all 158 projects to you this year, giving you next year's projects wouldn't be a problem either!"
As the project leader, Academician Xu knew these national projects all too well. Most domestic scholars vied for these projects merely for title selection and research funding.
In the early stages, they indeed put forth a lot of effort in preliminary research, but once the project was secured, they started slacking off. After three to five years, they would submit a report on the project's conclusion, with eighty percent of the projects almost having no practical effects.
Not to mention anything else, the report on cancer targeting treatment by Zhang Menglong alone was already worth more than their project conclusions.
He didn't care what Zhang Menglong's purpose was for applying for these projects. As long as he could properly research these, these matters had nothing to do with him; he only cared about the results.
Concerning physics research, Academician Xu ranked among the top ten domestically. Most projects on physics research, even if he couldn't delve deeply, he could still grasp the general idea.
He extracted several reports on physics research, and the very first one excited him almost to death.
In this national project, the requirement was merely to study the microscopic particles of materials and derive some fundamental physical laws regarding microscopic particle mechanics.
Yet in this report, Zhang Menglong not only verified these laws, he even researched an application method!
"Strong Interaction Material!"
This term, once found only in science fiction novels, had appeared for the first time in a scientific research project proposal.
The report clearly narrated some derivations of the laws on material microscopic mechanics and the conclusions from some experimental data, and even elevated the topic further!
The Strong Interaction Material is a terrifying material from the science fiction novel "Three-Body" that can alter the forces between microscopic particles of a material, securing them together from the level of quarks, thus increasing the density of the material to extreme levels, making its strength and hardness exceed the strongest known materials on Earth by hundreds to thousands of times!
If such a thing could genuinely be manufactured, to say nothing of other domains, just the military domain alone could lead to the direct collapse of other countries!
Subsequently, the remaining reports, one by one, seemed to open the doors to a new world for Professor Xu, presenting endless concepts and new theories that drew him back to his student days of fervently absorbing knowledge.
"The younger generation is to be feared, truly to be feared!"
"How about it, Academician Xu, about what we just discussed..."
"Give me three days. I want to verify the quality of these project proposals with others. If there are no problems, I'll hand all these projects over to you."
"OK!" Zhang Menglong agreed readily, knowing that such scholars would definitely not engage in any underhanded dealings academically.
"Professor Xu, may I make a request?"
"Don't, don't call me Professor; I'm not worthy," Academician Xu joked. But in truth, if all these were written by Zhang Menglong, then there is no one in the world qualified to be his teacher. "Go ahead, what's your request? Do you need funding or manpower?"
Now, it was no longer Zhang Menglong worrying if Academician Xu would give him these projects, but rather Academician Xu worrying if Zhang Menglong would be willing to take them on.
In the past, having no other alternatives, Academician Xu had to select the most reliable and capable individuals from the applicants to take on those research projects.
If Zhang Menglong truly could take on these, within a few years, Huaxia could achieve significant breakthroughs and leaps forward in both fundamental and applied sciences. By then, even if Academician Xu should pass away, he could do so with a smile from beyond.
"If you are willing to take on these projects, I can apply for at least ten million in funding for each project!"
These numbers even shocked Elder Zhou; this added up to a total of over ten billion yuan in funds. Under normal circumstances, the annual national budget for these projects was only about fifty to sixty billion yuan.
From this, it can be seen that Academician Xu truly cared a great deal about this matter.
"That won't be necessary," Zhang Menglong shook his head, "I can cover the research funding myself."
"This..."
"Haha, Elder Xu, you don't need to save money for this young man," Elder Zhou laughed, "Your money probably doesn't even match the interest he earns from his bank in a few days!"
"You..."
"His name is Zhang Menglong!"
"You are Zhang Menglong?" Xu suddenly laughed, he had just actually asked the world's richest man, with a wealth of trillions, whether he needed research funding.
Although these were two different matters, it still felt a bit like playing the lute to a cow. Even the national yearly investment in all Science construction wouldn't come close to Zhang Menglong's wealth.
"So what are your requirements?"
"I hope these projects can be credited under the name of our Jiangnan University of Science and Technology!"
"Okay!" Academician Xu originally thought it was a tremendous request, but it turned out to be only a matter of nominal attribution.
Although other schools might have some opinions when the time comes, if you have the capability, you can do it too, but the question is, can you?
What he produces overnight, you probably couldn't research even a bit of it in a year, right?
These research achievements were enough to shut those top universities up!
...
In three days, Xu, bearing these materials, visited nearly all top-tier research institutes in Huaxia; anyone who saw these materials was shocked for an entire year, and they even suspected that Academician Xu might have hijacked some alien's database.
Having obtained these authoritative confirmations, he could finally entrust these projects to Zhang Menglong with confidence.
As per Zhang Menglong's request, since these projects were to be given to Jiangnan University of Science and Technology, naturally, they needed to be communicated through the school level.
As the director of the school's scientific research center, Han Jinyu received a call from the National Science and Technology Commission.
"Is this Professor Han from Jiangnan University of Science and Technology?"
"Yes, it's me. Who is this?"
"Hello, I am Xu Dengfeng from the Science Commission."
"Academician Xu!" The drowsiness induced by the hot midday was instantly dispelled from Han Jinyu on hearing the name.
"Professor Han, I am here today to discuss something with you."
"Please speak." Han Jinyu was somewhat surprised. Xu Dengfeng was the head of the Science Commission, responsible for all national projects, and to receive a call personally from him—aside from the chip project which had concluded, he hadn't taken on any major national projects in recent years.
"This year, the nation has a total of 158 scientific research projects, and after the committee's discussion, all are to be undertaken by your university. I wonder what Professor Han thinks about this?"
"What... What?" Han Jinyu nearly lost his balance.
What did 158 scientific research projects mean? At Jiangnan University of Science and Technology, they had managed to secure just one national level scientific research project in the past three years. For these 158 projects to come at them all at once was literally earth-shattering!
"Your university, regardless of any difficulties, whether in terms of funding or personnel staffing, can mention them all; we will prioritize them for processing."
"No... No problem!" Suddenly recalling Zhang Menglong's earnest promise a few days earlier, along with the task of gathering research projects from the university's professors, Han Jinyu instantly understood.
What kind of magic had Zhang Menglong used to make Academician Xu hand over all 158 key national research projects to them?
Merely undertaking these projects, even if temporarily without results, also spawned 10 points each, for a university capable of undertaking projects also demonstrated its research capabilities.
These 158 projects, even if there were no results after a month, would still tally up to 1580 points, enough for them to compete with top-ranked universities.
Just after hanging up, Zhang Menglong's call came through.
"Menglong, what on earth did you do?"
"Nothing much, just slightly showcased my prowess, wasn't it just about the selection of pilot universities? This aspect of project selection, hasn't this solved it?"