Among the 133 new academicians in 2023, there is a person whose highest academic degree is technical secondary school!

Recently, the list of newly elected academicians of the two academies in 2023 has been finalized! This time, 59 new academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and 74 new academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering have been added.

Among the 133 newly elected academicians, each with a doctorate, a researcher with a secondary technical school education background stands out. He is Xia Ningshao, a professor at Xiamen University and director of the National Engineering Technology Research Center for Infectious Disease Diagnostics and Vaccines.

Xia Ningshao was elected as an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering (Photo from Xiamen University)

The road to counterattack from technical secondary school

On the evening when the list of 2023 academicians of the two academies was released, the official microblog of Shaoyang University, a university in Hunan, sent a congratulatory message to congratulate Professor Xia Ningshao, a graduate of Class 59 of the 78th Medical Academies, on his election as an academician of the Medical and Health Division of the Chinese Academy of Engineering. The fate of Xia Ningshao and Shaoyang University can be traced back to his school experience.

Shaoyang University sent a congratulatory letter

Xia Ningshao was born in Loudi, Hunan in 1964. In that era, most people dropped out of school early and chose to farm at home or work outside, but Xia Ningshao always insisted on using knowledge to change his destiny.

Hard work pays off. In 1978, Xia Ningshao was admitted to the then Shaoyang Medical School (now Shaoyang College). In 1981, after graduating from technical secondary school at the age of 17, Xia Ningshao came to work at the People's Hospital of Loudi District, Hunan Province (now Loudi Central Hospital), starting from the most basic work, and worked there for 15 years.

While working at Loudi Central Hospital, Xia Ningshao was not content with the status quo. While being a good doctor, he also actively studied and worked hard to improve his scientific research level. Although his secondary technical school degree was not a high starting point, Xia Ningshao made a series of achievements with his solid medical foundation and outstanding medical talent.

In 1993, Xia Ningshao won the second prize of Hunan Science and Technology Progress Award for his project "Survey on Hepatitis C Infection among Ethnic Groups in China". In 1994, he was successfully promoted to deputy chief physician of Loudi Central Hospital. It was during this period that Xia Ningshao's fate ushered in a new turning point. He met his "mentor" in life - Zeng Ding, the former director of the Department of Biology of Xiamen University.

By chance, Director Zeng Ding met Xia Ningshao, who was only 28 years old at the time. He was very impressed by this young man who was determined to do scientific research and studied hard on his own. So he strongly recommended him to the leaders of Xiamen University, hoping to transfer him to Xiamen University.

With Zeng Ding's strong recommendation, Zhu Chongshi, then vice president of Xiamen University and in charge of personnel, decided to meet with Xia Ningshao. After this meeting, the transfer order to associate professor of Xiamen University was sent to Xia Ningshao. In 1994, Xia Ningshao and his wife were transferred to Xiamen University and began to serve as an associate researcher of Xiamen University.

Days at Xiamen University

After arriving at Xiamen University, Xia Ningshao's scientific research talent was quickly put to good use. In 1995, the virology research group was established under the Key Laboratory of the Ministry of Education of the Department of Biology of Xiamen University, which became the starting point of Xia Ningshao's research.

Since he started his research career, Xia Ningshao has always taken "solving the needs of the country and the people" as his research direction. At that time, AIDS had just been introduced to China for ten years, but it spread quickly and was very harmful, posing a serious threat to national health. In order to effectively prevent and control it, diagnosis must come first.

In 1992, the United States took the lead in launching the third-generation AIDS diagnostic reagents, which significantly improved the detection sensitivity and shortened the detection window period compared with the second generation. However, at that time, China was completely dependent on imports for the third-generation AIDS diagnostic reagents. The key reason was that there was no high-quality HIV biologically active raw materials available domestically.

Under this situation, Xia Ningshao led his team to launch a research on HIV biologically active raw materials, hoping to achieve import substitution.

In 1999, Xia Ningshao's team was the first in China to break through the difficulty of HIV biologically active raw materials, completely solving the "coreless" problem of AIDS diagnostic reagents, and developed the first third-generation HIV antibody diagnostic kit in China, helping my country's domestic AIDS diagnostic reagents to successfully achieve the first upgrade. Due to the breakthroughs in HIV antigens and third-generation diagnostic reagents, Xia Ningshao's team won the second prize of the National Science and Technology Progress Award in 2001.

Xia Ningshao

After the research on AIDS diagnostic reagents was on track, Xia Ningshao and his research team began to challenge the more difficult development of a vaccine for hepatitis E virus, and this time he worked on it for 14 years.

Hepatitis E is a type of acute viral hepatitis caused by the hepatitis E virus. It is an acute infectious disease that is mainly transmitted through the digestive tract. Every year, 20 million cases of hepatitis E virus are infected worldwide, resulting in more than 3 million cases of acute hepatitis and 57,000 deaths. In the late 1980s, the most serious hepatitis E epidemic in history broke out in Xinjiang, my country, infecting a total of 120,000 people. Pregnant women are the group most affected by hepatitis E, with a mortality rate of 20%, and often causing miscarriage and stillbirth.

After 14 years of hard work day and night, in 2012, the world's first hepatitis E vaccine with completely independent intellectual property rights, with the participation of more than 200 core R&D personnel and an investment of 500 million yuan, was officially launched in my country. Clinical trials showed that the vaccine is 100% protective.

The world's first hepatitis E vaccine

This research result has attracted widespread attention from the world's scientific research community. Nature published an article saying that it "serves as a model for China's booming biotechnology field, is a unique successful example of China's public-private partnership, and has reference significance for the development of vaccines for other diseases that have not been paid attention to in the West."

A sword is sharpened by grinding, and the fragrance of plum blossoms comes from the bitter cold. After the results of the 2023 election of academicians of the two academies were announced, many people on the Internet were full of praise for Academician Xia Ningshao's experience, believing that he embodied the most precious scientific research spirit and achieved a gorgeous "reversal" in life.

Little do people know that what is behind all this is the concentration and hard work of working six days a week, more than 300 days a year, and an average of 12.7 hours a day. As Xia Ningshao said, "Some people may think that we can always grasp the cutting-edge direction, but our current achievements do not rely on talent, but patience and perseverance."