The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) hosted an image competition to foster youth’s innovation consciousness and inspire their enthusiasm for scientific research.

The young CAS scientists captured the amazing images with keen perspectives and fertile imaginations and demonstrated the unique charm of scientific research. Let’s take a closer look at what they found.

A reflection of labor

Photo by Wang Guanqin, Institute of Botany, CAS

In early July 2017, Wang Guanqin and his colleagues, together with some workers, built a climate-modeling experimental platform at a site 3,900 meters above sea level on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau to simulate global warming.

The photo was captured in the afternoon after a cold day of heavy rain, when they were working hard on a tight schedule. Wang happened to see the figure of his fellows and workers against an acrylic device when he was installing a panel.

The device reflected their hard work under a clear blue sky dotted with white clouds, creating a precious photo that records the researchers’ efforts to explore nature and protect the home of all human beings.

Yao Tandong, head of the CAS Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, and his team braved hardship and dangers to inspect the avalanche of ice in Ali prefecture, Tibet, Sept 28 - Oct 5, 2016. Two devastating ice-falls had occurred in the area between July 17 and Sept 21, 2016.

Wang said he was deeply touched by the scene and glad he was there to capture it. “The dazzling sunshine and the standing iceberg are not as encouraging as the researchers in red in front of me. I think that only a truly great scientist can climb the summit bravely in pursuit of the truth of science by taking risks,” he added.

A light in the distance

Photo by Zhang Miao, Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, CAS

The photo shows the first China-developed proton therapy demonstration device, a quadrupole magnet. The developers’ ingenious design, construction and precise alignment ensure the magnets’ extraction of high-quality beams, and enable cancer patients suffering from illness to see the "light" of hope of a cure. The research team who participated in the project made joint efforts to pursue that distant "light".

Source: Voice of Youth, Chinese Academy of Sciences