Top 10 scientific issues concerning human development revealed

The Chinese scientific community has announced the top 10 scientific issues concerning the development of human society in 2022, with a focus on climate change, urban growth and manufacturing.

The list has been published annually since 2019. It is compiled by the China Association for Science and Technology and global analytical firm Elsevier, with the goal of forging consensus among international scientific communities and jointly tackling these issues.

Luo Xiangang, an academician at the Chinese Academy of Engineering, and Bob Cryan, president of The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET), an organization for professional engineers, unveiled the list at the fourth World Science and Technology Development Forum in Chengdu, Sichuan province, on Monday.

The climate and cities categories each have three questions, while manufacturing has four.

The biggest climate-related scientific issues include: how to stabilize the Earth's climate by developing the green economy; how to effectively respond to global climate events such as extreme weather; and what mechanism should be adopted to achieve carbon emission targets while taking into account socioeconomic development.

The list for cities featured questions on: how to build a green and efficient recycling system for urban waste resources; how to build a high-speed, three-dimensional, interconnected and intelligent livable urban area; and how to optimize urban layouts and functions to reduce resource consumption.

As for manufacturing, the questions center on how intelligent manufacturing will promote the transformation, upgrading and innovative development of the world manufacturing industry; how to perceive the lowest common fundamental scientific issues, such as photosynthesis and high-precision green manufacturing; how companies can transition from resource-intensive, high-carbon manufacturing to decentralized, low-carbon manufacturing; and how to achieve atomic precision surface processing in post-Moore era chip manufacturing.