Shortly after Gao Sheng handed over the technical data, Yang Yunhe reciprocated by providing Gao Sheng with technical data related to Black Gold.
This data pertained to two special alloys manufactured using Black Gold, possessing incredibly miraculous properties. Upon viewing the data for these two alloys, Gao Sheng’s experts were all overcome with excitement, offering a small measure of comfort to Parkinson.
It was around this time that news of Jiangnan Group's decision to build a new high-energy particle collider began to spread globally.
In reality, this was somewhat of a semi-public announcement. A foreign journalist, while routinely browsing some of China's government websites, accidentally discovered a newly added project: the Super Superconducting Positron-Electron Collider Project, with Jiangnan Group listed as the responsible party.
The news then exploded. After all, the accident in Europe earlier that year had been a highly popular topic. Huang He had even appeared in Europe afterwards, leading to major news like fighter jets forcing a plane to land.
It was initially thought that with the retrieval of the remains to China, everything had been settled. Who would have expected such a turn of events, with Jiangnan Group deciding to build a new high-energy particle collider?
Instantly, this news was reignited in the West. Journalists began frantically gathering related information and interviewing all knowledgeable individuals, leading to more and more details being gradually released in the media, gradually clarifying the entire situation.
It was at this point that the journalists realized Jiangnan Group seemed to be serious; they were genuinely going to build a high-energy particle collider.
Of course, some people expressed disdain. For instance, a reporter interviewed Professor Yang, a Nobel laureate, to ask for his views on Jiangnan Group's new high-energy particle collider.
Professor Yang did not offer much in response, merely stating, "Let’s wait until they build it."
Many people argued fiercely online, debating whether Jiangnan Group would indeed spend a colossal amount of money to construct this high-energy particle collider.
Such arguments clearly wouldn't yield any results. One journalist, therefore, decided to directly ask Huang He for the truth.
However, interviewing Mr. Huang was not an easy task. As time went on, Huang He's whereabouts became increasingly discreet, and he rarely participated in any press events, making it very difficult to secure an interview.
But where there’s a will, there’s a way. Soon, someone found an opportunity to interview Huang He.
That opportunity was the annual Huang He Award ceremony.
Since Mr. Huang established the Huang He Award 10 years ago, it had never been interrupted, continuously bestowing six major awards each year to outstanding individuals who had contributed to China's scientific development.
Over the past decade, due to its annual hosting, the Huang He Award, while not as explosively popular as in its first two years, had seen its influence in the scientific community steadily rise.
This was because, unlike other awards that were merely ceremonial or sought harmony, the Huang He Award was different.
While the nominations for the Huang He Award were managed by a nomination committee, the final decision on who would receive the award remained firmly in Mr. Huang's hands. And given Mr. Huang’s character, he would naturally avoid any foul play, exclusively awarding those who had made the greatest contributions to their fields.
As a result, the credibility of the Huang He Award began to climb, and its appeal gradually shifted from relying solely on substantial cash prizes to the inherent prestige of the award itself.
To give a simple example, in the biographies of many researchers, the title of "Huang He Award Laureate" was placed as the first and foremost credential. This signified that society as a whole gradually recognized the Huang He Award as one of the highest honors for scientists.
It was akin to how almost all scientists were very willing to add the title of "Nobel Laureate" to their names.
Naturally, foreign scientists were indifferent to this, as they were not eligible to receive the Huang He Award.
Much like the Nobel Prize, a month before the announcement of the Huang He Award laureates, speculating on the year's list of recipients became the most engaging topic for all media outlets.
To maintain the highest degree of fairness for the Huang He Award, all procedures, except for Mr. Huang's personal selection, were essentially made public.
The process began with nominations for the Huang He Award, commencing immediately after the conclusion of one award ceremony for the next year's event.
The first stage was public nomination, which lasted for nine months. According to the rules, any ten Chinese citizens, with their personal identification, could collectively visit the Huang He Award Nomination Committee to nominate anyone as a candidate for the Huang He Award.
From this rule, it was evident that the nomination process itself was quite easy. After the nine-month public nomination period, each award category would typically have over a thousand candidates, sometimes even reaching five figures.
Among these were many eccentric individuals, and the list of all nominated candidates was directly published on the official Huang He Award website.
However, expecting the nomination committee to sift through a list of over a thousand candidates would clearly be too taxing for these committee members.
Therefore, from the ninth to the tenth month, during this one-month period, the public voting phase took place.
All citizens with Chinese nationality could register as members of the official website by using their identification and undergoing video verification. With this membership account, they could then vote for all the candidates. However, the voting process also required video verification to ensure that the account holder was indeed the one casting the vote.
Yes, Jiangnan Group already possessed mature facial IP recognition technology, so verifying the identity of voters was not an issue.
Ultimately, for each category, the top ninety candidates based on total votes would advance to the secondary selection round. However, considering that public voting could sometimes lead to manipulation, or that most ordinary people might not understand the achievements of various candidates, it often resulted in highly outstanding candidates failing to make it to the shortlist. Therefore, any member of the nomination committee had the right to select one candidate from those who had been eliminated to join the secondary selection.
Following this, the nomination committee would proceed with its work. Through internal voting, the committee would select an additional twenty candidates from all the secondary selection candidates for each category, serving as the final nominees to be presented to Huang He for the ultimate decision on the laureates.
Since everything up to this point was completely public, the twenty nominated candidates were directly announced on the official website one month before the Huang He Award ceremony.
This was then followed by a month-long media frenzy, with media outlets passionately discussing each nominated candidate and speculating on who would win the Huang He Award prize money of one hundred million yuan that year.
Of course, there were occasional instances where individuals not among the twenty nominated candidates ultimately received the Huang He Award. This was because Mr. Huang himself also possessed the opportunity to directly nominate a candidate, being able to select someone from the previously eliminated candidates to become a nominated candidate.
However, if Mr. Huang directly selected someone, it essentially meant he had already favored that individual, and the Huang He Award was bound to go to them. Announcing this in advance would be akin to leaking information prematurely.
Therefore, if Mr. Huang made a direct selection, it was not subject to public announcement.
However, since the inception of the Huang He Award, such occurrences were infrequent, happening only seven or eight times in total.
Averaging this out, each award category would only encounter this situation about once, which was indeed a low probability.
Regarding which award generated the most heated discussion among the media, it was invariably the Huang He Literary Award.
This was because, among the six major awards of the Huang He Award, apart from the literary works related to the literary award, which were the most easily understood and accessible to the public, over 95% of ordinary people had never even heard of the other five awards, naturally resulting in less fervent discussion.
Simultaneously, the Literary Award was also the category where nominated candidates were most prone to unexpected outcomes. There had been three occasions where Mr. Huang directly nominated individuals who were not on the list of twenty provided by the nomination committee.
The most widely known of these was the Huang He Award of the previous year. Among the initial nomination list of over one hundred people, the most popular was Liu Cixin, who had just completed the "Three-Body Problem" trilogy.
Given the immense influence of his work, he naturally became the most vocal candidate for the award among the public.
Unexpectedly, after the professional nomination committee's selection, Liu Cixin's name was not on the final list of twenty nominees. This sparked widespread outcry online. However, the members of the nomination committee remained steadfast, stating that science fiction works had never been considered high art, and historically, no science fiction work had ever won the Nobel Prize in Literature, thus it would not win the Huang He Literary Award either.
This response infuriated netizens, but they were powerless to do anything.
Then, the list of laureates was revealed. Liu Cixin unexpectedly won the Huang He Award, while the twenty individuals nominated by the nomination committee received nothing. This left the twenty individuals attending the Huang He Award ceremony with extremely displeased expressions, akin to pigskin.
For instance, Mo Yan, who was the most vocal candidate and had prepared to receive the award directly, clearly showed his disappointment when he saw Da Liu ascend the stage. The netizens, on the other hand, cheered enthusiastically, praising Mr. Huang as the fairest person in the world.
However, what followed was even more satisfying: the literary committee members of the nomination committee underwent a collective overhaul. Apart from a few committee members who insisted on nominating Da Liu, the rest were essentially expelled from the nomination committee.
Not only did they lose their subsidies, but more importantly, their reputations were tarnished.
Consequently, this year's Huang He Literary Award remained a subject of intense media discussion. However, the situation of popular works being directly excluded, as seen last year, was no longer present.
Among them, three were the most popular. First was Mo Yan, who had been a perennial runner-up, and his "Feng Ru Fei," followed by Zheng Yuanjie and his "Bai Ke."
However, these two were not the most popular. The highest popularity belonged to an online author, Lan Jing, who entered the nominations for the first time, and his "Magic Apprentice."