Vietnamese fresh spring rolls were found to have compounds that kill harmful bacteria in food. Photo: RMIT. Professors and researchers at RMIT University (Australia) have shown how to use this natural bacteria-killing compound to keep food fresh for longer. Weapons to kill bacteria A team of researchers from RMIT University was inspired to learn about the potential, antibacterial properties of Nem chua after traveling to Vietnam. They were surprised to see people who ate this raw meat without getting sick even in hot and humid climates. The research team, led by Professor Andrew Smith (Griffith University, Australia) and Dr Bee May, has discovered a new type of germicidal compound in spring rolls. That’s Plantacyclin B21AG, a group of compounds made by bacteria to kill other rival strains of bacteria. This compound is said to be much more potent than previously created man-made preservatives as food preservatives. The harmful bacteria Listera (green) dies after being exposed to the compound in Vietnamese spring rolls, Plantacyclin B21AG. Plantacyclin B21AG can survive at 90 degrees Celsius for 20 minutes and remains stable at high or low pH levels. This compound has the ability to kill a wide range of pathogenic organisms commonly found in food, Listeria, potentially life-threatening, persisting in the refrigerator or even when frozen. Study co-leader Professor Oliver Jones said there was a growing need for natural alternatives to artificial food preservatives. The reason for this is the change in people’s consumption habits. Safe for humans Professor John, associate dean of the Department of Food Science and Technology at RMIT University, said: “Scientists have known this natural bacteria-killing compound for many years. But the challenge was to manufacture it. obtain them in quantities large enough for use in the food industry”. “The structural compound of Nem chua is colorless, odorless, tasteless and very tough. Through this new study, we have identified suitable growth conditions that allow us to produce this compound in large quantities. large, potentially industrial scale. I hope this is an effective, safe and natural solution to both waste and potentially food-borne diseases,” said Professor John. Australian professors and doctors were surprised that spring rolls made from raw meat are not harmful to people. Photo: Vietnamdiscovery. Dr Elvina Parlindungan, who completed the study, said: “Using natural bacteria themselves as effective preservatives in food, we are turning bacteria’s toxic weapons against them. This smart solution from nature will solve all the major challenges in food technology. In the future, these compounds could also be useful as antibiotics in medicine.” Following the discovery, researchers at RMIT University began testing methods for purifying the compound and are planning to include it in experimental products. They look forward to working with many potential industry partners to further develop food technology. This work was supported by a PhD scholarship from the Indonesian Education Foundation (Indonesian Ministry of Finance), awarded to Dr. Parlindungan. Instructions for making fresh melted cheese cake Freshly melted cheesecake can be easily made at home. Housewives can show off their baking skills with familiar ingredients.

All of these vaccines are allocated to priority subjects according to Resolution 21 and localities with industrial parks. Vaccines for COVID-19. Photo: Times of India. In addition, from now until the end of the third quarter, Vietnam will also receive an additional 2 million doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine ordered by the Ministry of Health through VNVC. In the third quarter, information from the pharmaceutical company Pfizer said that 3 million doses of vaccine can be shipped to Vietnam, the rest will be concentrated in the fourth quarter. However, the specific time and quantity may change due to dependents. of the world situation. According to Professor Dang Duc Anh, the COVID-19 vaccine has a very short shelf life, only about 6 months. Meanwhile, the time from the production facility to Vietnam takes about 2 months, so it only takes 3-4 months to deploy the injection. In particular, Pfizer’s vaccines must be stored at deep minus temperatures (-70 degrees Celsius). If the temperature is 2-8 degrees Celsius, this vaccine is only used for one month. Therefore, in the coming time, the Ministry of Health will coordinate with units of the Ministry of National Defense across the country to ensure the preservation and transportation of vaccines to the injection point in the shortest time. Up to this point, Vietnam has urgently approved four COVID-19 vaccines: AstraZeneca, Sputnik V, Sinopharm and Pfizer. Vietnam aims to have 150 million doses of COVID-19 vaccine this year for at least 70-80% of the population, to form herd immunity. However, only 4 batches of AstraZeneca’s vaccine have arrived in Vietnam with a total of nearly 2.9 million doses. Earlier, Minister of Health Nguyen Thanh Long stated that Vietnam is facing the 4th wave of COVID-19 epidemic with the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 capable of spreading quickly and widely. The Vietnamese government is drastically directing epidemic prevention and control measures to soon stabilize the situation. One of Vietnam’s priorities in COVID-19 prevention is to have a COVID-19 vaccine early and to implement broader vaccination coverage for the population. Therefore, in parallel with efforts to find, negotiate and discuss with partners and vaccine manufacturers to bring vaccines to Vietnam, the Ministry of Health and related ministries and branches also focus on developing domestic vaccines to gradually ensure vaccine autonomy. At the same time, Vietnam also participates in COVAX’s global vaccine supply mechanism.

——AMTuring

In the autumn of 1950, Alan Turing, who was hailed as the “Father of Artificial Intelligence” by later generations, in the opening chapter of his book “Computing Machinery and Intelligence”, tossed out this seems to be “ Whimsical “The problem. Also in this article, Turing proposed a concept that appeared even earlier than “Artificial Intelligence (AI)”—— Turing test . This opened the prelude to human beings’ arduous exploration in the field of AI.

Time flies, and the stars change. Over the past 70 years, AI, which has experienced three waves of development, is quietly entering the daily lives of our ordinary people with various faces. Facial recognition, assisted driving, intelligent medical imaging and other applications are gradually becoming part of the “usual” part of human society, thanks to the continuous maturity of AI technology . And behind this is the continuous investment in AI research and development by academia, industry and even various countries. At present, the research and development of AI in countries around the world has gradually become a “race” trend. But to truly pass the “Turing Test”, no country has yet to be able to do so.

On June 1, at the 2021 Beijing Zhiyuan Conference, the ultra-large-scale intelligent model “Enlightenment 2.0” was officially released. With its 1.75 trillion parameters, it set the world’s largest pre-trained language model record and successfully demonstrated China’s AI technical strength to the world. It is reported that “Enlightenment 2.0” consists of four pre-training models of Wenyuan, Wenlan, Wenhui, and Wenshuo.

Among this, “Wenlan” is good at semantic understanding, visual-language retrieval, etc. Aroused great interest from Meike.com. It is reported that, Wenlan’s strong understanding of semantic information has reached the world’s “leading” level, which can be regarded as a breakthrough in the world’s AI field.Its capabilities are highly scalable and can be applied in a variety of scenarios . Through the research of Wenlan, human beings and the seemingly out of reach of the “Turing Test” are one step closer. The Wenlan R&D team is led by Professor Wen Jirong, Executive Dean of the Gaoling School of Artificial Intelligence at Renmin University of China, and works closely with Beijing Zhiyuan Artificial Intelligence Research Institute.

Picture | Professor Lu Zhiwu

Through hard work, we are honored to interview the head of the model group of the Wenlan R&D team—— Professor Lu Zhiwu from Gaoling School of Artificial Intelligence, Renmin University of China , And chatted with him about the future of AI and the story behind Wenlan.

AI development is gradually entering a bottleneck, and the multi-modal pre-training model led by Wenlan may become the key to “breaking the game”

As we all know, the ultimate goal of artificial intelligence is Let machines have the same understanding and thinking ability as humans . But more than 70 years have passed, and there is still a long way to go before this goal.

As far as the academic community is concerned, although many AI technologies can have a positive impact on human life, from the perspective of the general trend, AI research and development seems to be reaching a “ bottleneck “. Both the academic circle and the industry need to discover a new “hot spot” in technology to stimulate the entire AI industry to continue to develop by leaps and bounds.

In this case, “Wen Lan” was born.

Professor Lu Zhiwu told reporters, “ In the end, any AI model is actually a neural network. In the past, the industry often used pure text or pure image mode for unimodal training of AI.But now it seems that its effect is not particularly effective . ”

With academic development, The Wenlan team began to focus on pre-training using graphic data pairs at the same time, hoping to tap the new potential of AI . But before this, there has been no successful case in this direction.

In order to obtain better results, the training data used by Wenlan 1.0 and 2.0 Upgraded from 30 million to 650 million unlabeled graphic data. The huge amount of data is very difficult for model training, but it also lays the foundation for Wenlan to have strong visual-language retrieval capabilities and certain common sense understanding capabilities.

In terms of training methods, the Wenlan R&D team adopted an efficient distributed multi-modal pre-training framework and proposed a multi-modal pre-training algorithm based on DeepSpeed ​​to maximize the use of GPU and CPU and optimally support cross-modality Contrast learning.

At present, Google and OpenAI, the top foreign AI R&D institutions, are also trying the research direction of the Wenlan team. The project names are Google ALIGN and OpenAI CLIP respectively. Lan is obviously better, so to speak, At present, Wenlan has reached the top level in the world in terms of mutual inspection of pictures and texts and semantic understanding.

So, where can Wenlan be applied? Professor Lu Zhiwu told reporters that the current Wenlan, like a “brain”, is highly adaptable and can be used in multiple scenarios. Taking one of its strong “retrieval and recommendation” capabilities as an example, Wenlan can be “handy” in the common business scenarios of multiple sub-industries in e-commerce, games, and video.

Professor Lu Zhiwu said “ If the AI ​​we have learned in the past is only a child, now Wenlan is more and more likely to be close to an adult “.

Explore AI “subconsciousness”, “Turing Test” can see more dawn

Wenlan’s ability is beyond doubt. But for the Wenlan development team, After training on massive graphic data, does Wenlan really learn semantic information, and how strong is Wenlan’s understanding ability? , Has become a very attractive question.

For this reason, Wenlan’s R&D team decided to test Wenlan by means of “neuron visualization”. You can simply understand this as a “ Propositional painting “The test. We told Wenlan a meaningful sentence, let Wenlan feedback her understanding of this sentence in the form of a picture.

But please note that the picture feedback here is by no means matching the optimal solution from Wenlan’s existing picture data, nor is it an imitation of specific training data like some AI painting models.

At this time, Wenlan is more like an “ordinary person”. With the help of his own knowledge, he tries to understand the new information passed in from the outside world, and uses the form of pictures to “concrete” his own understanding. What the reaction is The objective existence in Wenlan’s “mind”.

Teacher Lu Zhiwu said “ (In this way) We visualize Wenlan’s “subconscious”, which is the most primitive imagination and understanding of a sentence in her mind . ”

How did Wenlan paint it? Simply put, we all know that on a computer, a picture is composed of pixels. By changing the color of each pixel, you can paint on the computer. And Wenlan, who got the text information, used this method to “original painting”, to express her understanding of the meaning of the sentences we gave with pictures. At this time, Wenlan can be compared to a balance. The two ends of the balance are images and texts. What Wenlan has to do is to make the meanings of the two “remain equal.” . It is worth noting that when visualizing neurons, all Wenlan model parameters are fixed and unchanged, only to modify the input initial noise image.

The Wenlan R&D team said: “ In this way, we can get a glimpse of Wenlan’s “inner world”. That is to let go of all evaluation and application restrictions on Wenlan, so that she can show the most primitive and true, unique understanding of the input text in her “subconscious”. ”

At present, according to Wenlan’s “paintings”, his ability to understand semantics has ranked among the top in the world. In addition to everyday language, Wenlan can also understand ancient poems and can even convey a certain “artistic conception”.

The following are some examples of Wenlan’s actual test (provided by Wenlan R&D team):

Statement to Wenlan: Make a wish on the birthday cake

(Interpretation: The image of the cake is very clear, there is also a candle, and there are dots and dots on the cake. The whole is a cheerful atmosphere for a birthday party.)

A sentence to Wenlan: The day is full of mountains, the Yellow River flows into the sea

(Interpretation: The mountain peaks in the distance obscured the setting sun but did not obscure the afterglow, and the nearby mountains ran towards us like a yellow river.)

Statement to Wenlan: The moon is falling and the sky is full of frost, Jiang Feng Yuhuo is sorrowful

(Interpretation: the red fire on the river, the awning boat nearby.)

Statement to Wenlan: You can pick lotus in the south of the Yangtze River, and He Tiantian with lotus leaves

(Interpretation: the budding lotus on the upper left, the lotus in the middle on the right, the lotus leaves and the whole green.)

Statement to Wenlan: The bright moon is born on the sea, and the end of the world is at this time

(Interpretation: The wavy sea below, and the rising moon on the sea. Although the original meaning of the verse is a full moon, it does not literally express the meaning of a full moon. The large abstraction of the background may be Wenlan’s interpretation of “the end of the world is at this time” Understanding.)

Foresight and persistence make Wenlan “come out of the sky”, diversification and intersection will become the new starting point of the AI ​​wave

For scientific research, correct judgment and persistence are sometimes more important than diligence and hard work. When talking about Wenlan’s research and development process, Professor Lu was deeply moved by it.

Since September last year, the Wenlan team has been working on multi-modal pre-training. Thinking of the process at that time, Professor Lu described: “ It was completely groping in the dark, and the multi-modal pre-training model was very difficult to do, but I still walked down this road decisively (weak correlation between graphics and text + two-tower model). ”

But exploration and persistence are risky. During this period, Professor Lu and his PhD students devoted themselves to this project, and therefore did not publish a paper for a long time. If the direction is wrong, or the model is not trained well, it will be a “grainless” result. The pressure on the entire team can be imagined.

At almost the same time, the front runners in the foreign AI industry: Google and OpenAI, are also doing similar things. And in January of this year, OpenAI released two models similar in direction to Wenlan: DALL-E and CLIP. While shocking the industry, it also proved that the selection of Professor Lu’s team was correct and forward-looking.

However, from the perspective of academic research in domestic universities, universities such as Qingbei seem to have more advantages in AI. Why is the National People’s Congress making a breakthrough in the AI ​​field this time?

Professor Lu Zhiwu believes that the advantage of the National People’s Congress lies in its liberal academic atmosphere and rich cultural ideas.

“ Dean Wen Jirong of Hillhouse College of Artificial Intelligence is very supportive of these valuable explorations.So our overall academic atmosphere is still very relaxed and open . ”

In addition, as a higher education institution specializing in humanities and social sciences, the National People’s Congress has its own unique way of understanding AI. In a sense, in view of the prevailing instrumental rationality, the National People’s Congress tends to be more value rational. This is also one of the reasons why Wenlan’s team was able to take the risk of “no revenue for particles” and insist on completing the research.

In the view of Meike.com, In addition to the unique advantages of the National People’s Congress, Wenlan’s success is inseparable from the forward-looking AI development possessed by Professor Lu Zhiwu, and the excellent capabilities of the entire Wenlan R&D team. .

On the long journey of AI exploration, “breaking” and “standing” are eternal topics. Although Wenlan has made breakthrough achievements, Professor Lu Zhiwu still modestly said that, on the whole, the future development of AI still requires the joint progress of related interdisciplinary subjects such as brain science and neuroscience. However, if the road is hindered and long, the line will come. we believe, Driven by the successful case of Wenlan, more “Wenlan” can emerge in China in the future, so that it can take off the “Turing Test”, the crown of AI, in one step faster. .

A man is vaccinated with AstraZeneca in Jakarta, Indonesia, June 15. Photo: AP The results showed that only 166 cases required hospitalization. Those who received two doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine were 92% effective without requiring hospitalization, while those who received the Pfizer vaccine, the figure was 94% after dose 1 and 96% after dose 2. “These findings suggest that the level of protection of people with Delta variant from hospitalization is very high. Understanding this is important in assessing the danger that Delta variant poses to the general population.” , the study authors concluded. “The effect of not requiring hospitalization because the Delta variant after one injection of AstraZeneca is 71% and after two injections is 92%. This metric really reassures India. To choose the direction, I think we should should use modeling approaches to devise different implementation strategies and compare the impact of vaccines at each stage of the epidemic,” commented Professor of Microbiology Gagandeep Kang of India. The Delta variant first appeared in India and has been classified as a “variant of concern” by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), while the World Health Organization (WHO) has called it a “variant of concern”. it is a ‘disturbing variation’. The Delta variant is expected to become a common strain in the US next fall, increasing the risk of a new wave of disease in unvaccinated people later this year.

Professor, Doctor of Science Tran Duy Quy, Director of the Asia-Pacific Institute of Science and Technology Cooperation and Chairman of the Vietnam Orchid Association, said the above price is not virtual. “With mutant orchids such as: Lan Vinh Khang, Dai Cat, Ngoc Son Cuoc…, if you achieve all the strictest elements of a beautiful orchid, the price will fluctuate from 1-10 billion VND/cm kie. (seedlings develop from the eyes of the mother plant)”, Mr. Quy said. How much does a mutant orchid cost? “There is no set price for mutant orchids. The expensiveness of a mutant orchid depends on the rarity and beauty of each plant,” Quy said and said that there are about 35,000 species of orchids in the world, about 1,010 species in Vietnam alone, while mutant orchids have about 100 varieties. According to the professor, not every mutation will be expensive. There are mutant orchid varieties costing only a few tens of thousands of dong such as: Hac Vy Trang, Phi Diep Trang… These are popular orchids in the playing community and market, easy to find in nature, widely propagated. cobble. Orchid currently has about 35,000 different types in the world. Photo: Hainan. Meanwhile, Dai Ngan Butterfly, Juliet, Ngoc Son Cuoc, Pleiku Eyes… are some mutant orchids with very expensive market prices. The reason explained by Mr. Quy is that these orchids are created by nature over millions of years, and at the same time, the flowers that grow from these orchids reach perfection on very strict criteria. As an example of the white 5-petal mutant orchid Phu Tho, the President of the Vietnam Orchid Association said this orchid was found by a Central Circus in 1972 in Phu Tho. Then, they hand it over to the indigenous people to cultivate. “Currently, there are five white-petaled white berries in Phu Tho that are valued at 400-500 million VND/cm. But to have this price, the flowers from the tree must be perfect,” said Mr. Quy. Specifically, the tree structure must be clean – green (ie, no stains, no other colors); cotton must be pure white or clear as jade; horizontal “shoulder” – “wing” gourd; “eyes” are scratched like a girl’s eyelashes or must be very dark; hairy “lips”; The distinctive and special seductive fragrance “nose” must be so clean and white as snow. The “parts” of an orchid. Photo: HN When meeting the above criteria, according to Mr. Quy, a 5-petal white Phu Tho orchid can be sold for hundreds of billions of dong, depending on the height of the tree. “There are flowering mutant orchids that achieve all the requirements such as horizontal shoulders, gourd wings, fragrance… But if the nose of white flowers will cost a few billion, the nose of other crops will only be a few hundred thousand.” Mr. Quy shared. The professor said that currently, Vietnam has no council or agency or organization that accepts responsibility for pricing orchids. The price will be evaluated and given by the people in the playing community. The more people rate beautiful flowers, the higher the price. Therefore, recently, when the spread of orchids “bloomed”, the demand for orchids increased dramatically, leading to the price of orchids being “blown” higher than the real value. Mr. Quy said that this situation will decrease and end when the sudden supply of orchids balances with demand. Being deceived because of cheap greed, gullible gullibility According to the President of the Vietnam Orchid Association, there are two types of mutant orchids, natural mutations and artificial mutations. Natural mutation is a change in the nature of genes but occurs naturally, accumulated over millions of years and selected by nature, retaining the essence. Humans when finding this natural mutant will often use and propagate it. At the same time, the natural mutant orchid lines will have a very expensive price because of its rarity. Meanwhile, artificially mutated orchids are essentially changes to the plant’s genome but are influenced by humans. This has the disadvantage that the mutation in the gene can disappear and return to the original form (due to rapid artificialification, the gene structure is not stable). In addition, artificial mutations also have a very low probability of success, depending heavily on luck. “Artificial mutant orchid creators often orient mutations according to inherent standards such as horizontal shoulders, gourd wings, clean nose… But the results are rarely perfect, successful mutations but not recognized”, Mr. Quy shared. In the picture is kie lan (seedlings develop from the eyes of the mother plant). Photo: Hainan. Talking about the situation of scams when transactions spread suddenly recently, the professor said that people who are deceived are often greedy, inexperienced and gullible. “Scammers often use social networks to advertise. They take pictures, attach the name of mutant orchids and then sell them. These scammers often never dare to publicly disclose the exact name or address of the garden.” Mr. Quy commented when talking about transaction frauds spreading through the network. As for many cases, the victims went to the garden to see the mutant orchids with their own eyes, but when they bought the kies, they discovered they were cheated, Professor Quy said that the buyers were inexperienced. “It is not possible to detect or distinguish mutant orchids from normal orchids through kies. All kies are the same, only when flowering will they know if it is a mutant orchid or not,” the professor recommended. Experts give advice when dealing with orchids that need a paper contract, must find reputable places, come to the garden to see the tree and have the testimony of many people.

The 2021 Award evaluation process is carried out according to regulations, including checking application conditions; consult experts to review; evaluated at the Foundation’s Scientific Council (OSC) and the Award Council. On April 29, 2021, the Prize Council for 2021 met to evaluate and select applications. However, after more than 4 hours of discussion and voting, the Award Council decided not to recommend awarding the nominations. On May 13, 2021, the Minister of Science and Technology approved this proposal. Too few good records? Professor Ngo Viet Trung, Chairman of the Award Council, said that this year, although the number of applications for evaluation and selection was similar to previous years, after the initial review, there were only 2 scientific activities in Earth Science and Science. Environmental and Agricultural Biology nominate 2 entries for the Main Prize and 2 for the Junior Award for consideration at the Awards Panel. This year’s nominations are all in the experimental field, related to issues of concern to scientists around the world. It is the work of Assoc.Prof.Dr. Ngo Duc Thanh, Dr. Bui Minh Tuan on climate change in rain, and the work on the use of antibiotic substitutes in aquaculture by Dr. Do Huu Hoang, a project on the technical system of growing chrysanthemums on a large scale by Dr. Hoang Thanh Tung. Will young scientists have more opportunities at the Ta Quang Buu Prize? Prof. Nguyen Huu Duc, Chairman of the Physics Council, said that although this year the Science Council also received a number of applications, including works published in journals with IF coefficients, but did not nominate any works. to the Awards Committee. Explaining this, Prof. Duc said the reason is that most of these works have only been published about half a year ago, while the Physics Council thinks that it is necessary to evaluate the works at an international level, through by number of citations. “So the Physics committee members agreed to give it another year to have a more accurate assessment of the publication quality with these works.” In the Science Council in Mathematics, there are also two nominations that, according to Prof. Ngo Viet Trung, are of sufficient quality. However, at the time of voting, both of these applications did not receive 2/3 of the votes to be nominated to the Award Council. This may have caused a negative resonance if people did not understand the situation of this year “- Professor Trung shared. “However, I confirm that no works have been awarded the award that does not fully reflect the development reality of the country’s science and technology.” According to Professor Ngo Viet Trung, looking at the quality of international publication of basic science today, the number of articles in leading journals has increased markedly and the quality is much better than the time when there was a Ta Quang Buu Award. “However, each year the quantity and quality of applications for awarding the Prize depends on many other factors such as the self-nomination of scientists or the nomination of research and training organizations. create. Scientists are afraid to nominate themselves for the prize, while many agencies are not interested in nominating outstanding works. In addition, awarding a prize to an individual or to a work also limits nominations because scientific achievements are often confirmed through a cluster of works and through the cooperation of many scientists. Professor Ngo Viet Trung also said that it is important that the quality of the award is guaranteed. “It’s normal for an award not to be given by anyone. The Board of Directors has worked very seriously, not for the sake of having a prize but trying to award it, which will affect the prestige of the award. For example, China’s highest national award for science and technology (worth about $750,000) has gone without a prize twice, Mr. Trung cited. In particular, in 2015, there was no award, but China had a Nobel Prize in Medicine right before the national award. Young scientists need to be taken care of The 2021 season has passed, but according to Prof. Ngo Viet Trung, there are contents that the Foundation needs to discuss to draw lessons for the following years, so that the award can achieve the purpose of promoting research in basic science and technology. encourage young researchers. He also expressed the view that “need to pay more attention to young scientists”. “I and other members are trying to propose to the Ministry of Science and Technology so that each industry has a young award and the young award recipient will be a typical scientist for his or her specialty.” Prof. Nguyen Huu Duc also expressed his support that next year the regulations should change a bit, such as increasing the number of young prizes, and some more detailed award criteria. “Currently, the criteria of the award are heavy on hard indexes such as the influence of magazines, and the ability to deeply analyze the value of each work still has some shortcomings. Therefore, in my opinion, it is necessary to balance the hard criteria with the specific value and unique points of the work, plus expert opinion, public opinion because there are works published in ordinary journals but very difficult. excellent”. Ta Quang Buu Prize is an annual award of the Ministry of Science and Technology to encourage and honor scientists who play a key role in excellent scientific works, carried out in Vietnam, and published on the Internet. prestigious international scientific journals in the field of natural sciences and engineering. The award has been implemented since 2013, in the past 7 years, it has received more than 360 applications, awarded 16 main prizes and 4 awards for young scientists.

According to Professor, Dr. Pham Quang Minh, former Rector of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities, Vietnam National University, Hanoi, this is a very complete, comprehensive and profound article on the Party’s views. Communist Vietnam for the basic and most important contents of the Vietnamese revolution since the country was peaceful, independent and unified until now. That is the problem of building socialism and the path to socialism of the Vietnamese nation. In the article, the General Secretary posed the most crucial and decisive questions of the Vietnamese nation today, such as: What is socialism? Why did Vietnam choose the socialist path? How and how to gradually build socialism in Vietnam? According to Professor, Dr. Pham Quang Minh, the meaning of the article must be recognized, evaluated and considered in the current practical context, associated with three important factors. Firstly, the article was published on the eve of the election of deputies to the XV National Assembly and People’s Councils at all levels for the 2021-2026 term, that is, before an event of great significance, on the 23rd of this month. In May 2021, voters nationwide go to elect their representatives to the country’s highest authority. The General Secretary wants to remind everyone that it is not anyone else but the voters, who must raise their sense of responsibility and wisely choose talented and virtuous people to be elected to the National Assembly. Because this is the agency that makes important decisions about the path we have walked, the achievements we have achieved and will be the place to solve difficulties and challenges in the future. Secondly, the article was born in the context that our country celebrates the 131st birthday of President Ho Chi Minh, the founder of the State of Vietnam, the leader and teacher of the Vietnamese revolution. We review, look back on what we have done and the way to go. Thirdly, this is also an opportunity for the General Secretary to clarify his views and clearly define Vietnam’s position on the issue of socialism in Vietnam, in order to criticize wrong views, smear and distort the Vietnamese government. hostile forces in order to lower the Party’s prestige, sow distrust and shake people’s faith in the nation’s path to socialism. Sharing about the content of the article, Professor, Dr. Pham Quang Minh emphasized that the article has analyzed and clarified 5 new important points. First of all, the General Secretary affirmed that the achievements of capitalism are undeniable and that these are the achievements and common progress of mankind and therefore we need to be selectively absorbed. This is very important, because from time to time, there are also some people who think that everything that belongs to feudalism, capitalism, and the old regime is evil, wrong and comes to a clean denial. That is a conservative view, heavily colored with ideological confrontation, clearly distinguishing between us and the enemy, friend and enemy, what is good for us, and what is in the enemy’s is also bad. We recognize that capitalism has never been as global as it is today and has also achieved many great achievements, especially in the field of emancipation and development of productive power. science and technology development.” Second, when talking about socialism, the General Secretary mentioned three aspects, three connotations, and three qualities of socialism. It is socialism as a doctrine, a movement and a regime. Such a view of socialism is very scientific, multidimensional and comprehensive. Because, if one sees socialism only as a movement, it is easy to fluctuate because of the “up or down” of that movement. If we only look at socialism as a doctrine, it is easy to see that it is “sclerotic, dogmatic, backward”. And if you look at it as a regime, I am afraid that the reality in the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries makes it easy to doubt. Third, we often say that Vietnam went to socialism, ignoring the capitalist development stage, but in this article, the General Secretary pointed out, ignoring the capitalist development stage. that is, only ignoring the limitations of capitalism such as oppression, injustice, exploitation, and vices, but not ignoring the achievements of civilized values ​​that mankind has achieved in the period of capitalist development. capitalism and selective inheritance. We need to be wise, sober and selectively inherit the achievements and values ​​of civilization that humanity has achieved such as technology, economics, medicine, etc. Fourthly, Professor, Dr. Pham Quang Minh also said that, in the article, building socialism according to the General Secretary is creating a new type of society in terms of quality, which is unlike any other model. any picture in the world. Or the socialist-oriented market economy is a theoretical breakthrough. Those things are typical of Vietnam, only of Vietnam. Professor, Dr. Pham Quang Minh said: “This is the biggest challenge for Vietnam because if it has to build a completely new type of society that has not been found in the world, it will be extremely difficult and challenging, because Because we can’t learn from the experience of those who went before, we have to be the ones to pave the way to “exploit the mountain and break the stone”. But we can do it, because just like in the period of the American Resistance War, many countries are afraid of the US, don’t dare and don’t know how to fight the US? But we have researched, pondered, studied and made the determination that we can defeat the US and have defeated the US.” Finally, highly appreciate the conclusion of the General Secretary in the article: “We need to absorb and selectively supplement in the spirit of criticism and creativity the latest achievements in ideology and science to Our doctrines and doctrines are always fresh, always invigorated, carrying the breath of the times, not falling into stagnation, stagnation, and backwardness compared to life”, Professor, Tien Doctor Pham Quang Minh said that the General Secretary had clearly expressed his views on the importance of learning together with practice, theory must be closely linked with practice, learning critically, creatively, absolutely. not being dogmatic, machines lead to intellectual sclerosis and backwardness. More than ever, we must always raise the spirit of learning, absorbing creatively in a critical spirit, only then will we be “invigorated with new vitality”. According to Professor, Dr. Pham Quang Minh, this also shows that the General Secretary, through the article, wants to remind us that Vietnam’s science does not seem to have updated and absorbed the latest achievements. about the world’s ideology and science, have not yet applied these achievements creatively to the practice of building socialism in Vietnam. Going up to socialism associated with the path of sustainable development phát Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi, Standing Vice Chairman of the Vietnam Fisheries Association, said that as a 40-year-old Party member, he feels proud of the Party, firmly believes in the driver, and The Central Committee of the Party leads the country firmly on the path of building socialism, successfully realizing the “Vietnamese aspiration” as pointed out by the Resolution of the 13th National Party Congress. Agreeing with the General Secretary’s comments on global challenges related to inadequately resolving the relationship between development and the environment: “Along with the economic-financial crisis is the energy and wage crisis. In fact, the depletion of natural resources, the degradation of the ecological environment, etc. are posing enormous challenges for the existence and development of mankind”, Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi emphasized, the consequences of the non-environmental approach, development at all costs, does not consider the environment and resources as a mandatory factor to consider when choosing development and consumption methods. has left “the consequences of a process of socio-economic development taking profit as the ultimate goal, considering the possession of wealth and increasing material consumption as a measure of civilization, taking personal interests as a pillar of society”, as the General Secretary wrote. Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Chu Hoi said that, in the article, under the lens of analyzing theory, practice and lessons learned on dealing with the relationship between socio-economic development and environmental protection. environment, conservation of resources and cultural values ​​on a global scale clearly shows that the path to socialism is also associated with the path of sustainable development of the country in terms of economy, politics and society. society, culture and environment. It is the right choice, has strategic stature, ensures long-term economic efficiency, the country has “food and property”. From the perspective of his experience in the field of marine management, the Standing Vice Chairman of the Vietnam Fisheries Association shared that in order to realize the great ideas of the General Secretary, it is necessary to review the Land Law; develop a new law on the use of the sea to develop a green and sustainable marine economy, contributing to firmly protecting Vietnam’s rights and interests in the East Sea. In addition, it is very urgent to strengthen conservation activities in the sea, coastal areas and islands of our country, including both terrestrial and underground landscapes. All-encompassing and groundbreaking is the issue of human resources, in which people are affirmed as both the goal and the driving force to promote and maintain the country’s sustainable development. to the level of success of the process of implementing “Vietnam aspiration”. Therefore, in this article, the General Secretary has identified and oriented: “People hold a central position in the development strategy; cultural development, human development is both the goal and the driving force of the renovation; development of education – training and science – technology is the leading national policy; environmental protection is one of the vital issues, a criterion for sustainable development; Building a happy family, making progress as a healthy and solid cell of the society, realizing gender equality is the criterion of progress and civilization. In particular, these are not only priority tasks in innovation and creativity of the country on the road to building socialism, but also demonstrate the superiority of socialism that our Party steadfastly chooses. and do it patiently.

Professor Vo Tong Xuan was an international student in Japan in 1974. He studied at Kyushu University with research topics related to rice cultivation techniques in the tropics and completed his Doctoral Program ( Agronomy) here. After returning home, he continued to work at Can Tho University and together with Japanese researchers continue to do research topics related to rice cultivation techniques; publish many scientific articles, dissemination articles on agricultural techniques and policies on the mass media. Then, as a pioneer in the academic exchange between Japan and Vietnam in the field of Agronomy, he built the first foundation for cooperation between the two sides and delivered exert his best in this role. In 1997, as a research fellow and visiting lecturer of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, Kyoto University, he came to Japan for 1 year and had many research related to the model. Japan’s agricultural cooperative, as well as acting as a focal point for arranging study tours in Japan for Vietnamese farmers and policy-makers. After returning home, based on the research results at Kyoto University, he gave many introduction about agricultural policy, especially Japanese agricultural cooperatives, Japanese agricultural techniques in Japan. conferences in Vietnam. In addition, as an agronomist, he has made great contributions to strengthening cooperation in the agricultural sector between Japan and Vietnam through Japan’s ODA Cooperation Programs. ..

Professor Vo Tong Xuan (right) was honored to receive the Certificate of Merit from the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Japan. Photo: B.NG Professor Vo Tong Xuan studied in Japan in 1974, studying at Kyushu University with research topics related to rice cultivation techniques in the tropics and completed his doctoral program (Agronomy) here. After returning home, he continued to work at Can Tho University and together with Japanese researchers continued to work on topics related to rice cultivation techniques and together published many articles. science, popularization of agricultural techniques and policies. Then, as a pioneer in academic exchanges between Japan and Vietnam in the field of agronomy, he built the first foundation for cooperation between the two sides. In 1997, as a researcher and visiting lecturer at the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at Kyoto University, he came to Japan for 1 year and had many studies related to the agricultural cooperative model of Japan, as well as acting as a focal point for study tours in Japan for Vietnamese farmers and policy makers. After returning home, he introduced about agricultural policies, especially agricultural cooperatives and agricultural techniques of Japan. He also has many contributions to strengthening cooperation in the agricultural sector between Japan and Vietnam through Japan’s ODA cooperation programs. Typically the first Japanese cooperation program on agricultural engineering training through a cooperation project with the Faculty of Agriculture, Can Tho University (1970-1975), in the framework of a tripartite cooperation. Japan’s first time in Africa in the program “African Rice Development Alliance” initiated by JICA, advised and had many contributions in the “Technical Improvement Project to improve rice yield in the region. area of ​​Nante, Zambezia province, Mozambique ”(period 2011-2015) …

Variant B.117 was first spotted in London and neighboring Ken County. Photo: AP Researchers in Shanghai have traced the original evolutionary trail of variant B.117, which has caused a new wave of COVID-19 infections in several countries, according to the Morning Post. But they found no trace of it in virus samples collected from people around the world. However, when they expanded their search to animals, they discovered some of the original B.117 forms in dogs, including one taken in the US last July. Such precursor variants include most or all of the original variant B117 in the Canidae breed, and they may re-infect humans after a period of rapid mutation. ”, Professor Chen Luonan and colleagues at the National Key Cell Biology Laboratory, wrote in an article published April 16. The appearance of the B117 variant has puzzled researchers. After being isolated from two patients in Kent County, southeast England, and London in September 2020, it quickly became the dominant strain of SARS-CoV-2 in the UK and many other countries, at a rapid rate. spreads faster than previous strains. Some experts believe this variant may emerge from local communities under pressure from antiviral drugs used during the pandemic. According to a popular theory, it suddenly appeared in Britain and then spread to other parts of the world. But variant B.117 has nine distinct mutations, rarely found in previous human strains – according to Professor Chen et al. These mutations do not occur in adjacent genes, but spread across the entire genome of the virus. The likelihood of all of these mutations appearing at once is extremely low. The Shanghai team believes that the above nine mutations are produced one after the other. Their model suggests that the variant may have originated outside the UK and received mutations on a non-human host. Dogs are the most suspect, followed by weasels or cats. However, Qu Liandong, professor of virology at the Harbin Veterinary Research Institute, who was not involved in the study, said more solid evidence is needed to support this theory. According to Qu, the strains found in dogs are not quite the same as the first strains identified in British patients. And although the number of genome sequences that researchers have globally reached in the hundreds of thousands, it is still small compared to the total number of patients there. If the dog is to be a host, “we’ll have a big problem.” Photo: AP Professor Qu, who studies infectious diseases in humans and animals, said that if pets like dogs become hosts, “we will have a big problem”. “Nearly all of our measures against the pandemic so far have taken into account people only. If the animal was involved, it would completely change the ‘game’, he said. When bird flu breaks out on a chicken farm, all chickens there must be destroyed, according to standard worldwide practice. If the disease can infect humans, all susceptible animals – including healthy ones – must be disposed of in the affected area. Dogs are close companions for humans, but if they are proven capable of carrying or creating mutant variants of the Sars-CoV-2 virus, they can also be destroyed, Professor Qu said. An alternative solution is to vaccinate animals. “But we can’t give the dogs human vaccines. We may need to develop some completely new versions. We have had a hard time vaccinating humans. How can the program be extended to both dogs or other animals? ”- Professor Gu raised the problem. There is growing concern that the B.117 variant could make dogs very ill. Veterinarians near London noticed a sudden increase in pets – including dogs and cats – with myocarditis earlier this year, and many of these animals tested positive for variant B. 117 – according to a Reuters report in March 2021. Another problem is, humans and animals have different immune systems and it is often difficult for viruses to spread from one species to another. The SARS-CoV-2 virus is thought to have originated in bats, but it can take decades to adapt to humans. When and where it made the animal-to-human transition is still unclear. Professor Chen’s team said that variant B.117 has a unique evolutionary strategy of increasing infectivity, so it can spread more easily from host to host, but at the same time reducing the number of copies it makes in the host. The researchers believe that whether this strategy helps variant B.117 overcome the species gap requires further study.

This event is the fourth issue of the series “Everyone’s Lecture Hall·University and Contemporary Academics” co-sponsored by Nandu Book Club, Xueeryou Bookstore and Guangzhou Literature and Art Critics Association. Professor Peng Yuping will give a lecture and will be held by Professor Huang Shizhong from the Chinese Department of Sun Yat-sen University. Host and guest of dialogue. In addition to on-site listening and asking questions, you can also participate through the “Nandu Live”.

Professor Peng Yuping will start with the study of Wang Guowei and Kuang Zhouyi’s Ci studies, telling how he pays attention to, expands, and advances the academic history, how to deal with different academic opinions from his predecessors, etc.; at the same time, he will also have a dialogue with the Chinese opera scholar Professor Huang Shizhong and discuss together Wang Guowei’s pioneering efforts in the field of opera history are related to the international academic community; and Peng Yuping also has the latest research and views on the cause of Wang Guowei’s sinking to share with the public. The dialogue between the two Yangtze River scholars will surely bring out many sparks of thought.

Peng Yuping, Dean, Professor and Ph.D Supervisor of the Chinese Department of Sun Yat-Sen University, Editor-in-Chief of Journal of Sun Yat-Sen University (Social Science Edition), concurrently serving as Vice President of the Chinese Ci Society

Huang Shizhong, Professor of the Chinese Department of Sun Yat-sen University, Director of the Institute of Chinese Ancient Documents

In the study of modern Chinese academic history, Wang Guowei and Kuang Zhouyi are both popular figures. Wang and Kuang met in Shanghai at the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China. They had a lot of communication in the study of Ci. For a long time, the academic circles believed that Wang Guowei and Kuang Zhouyi’s theory and aesthetics of Ci were roughly opposite.

Wang Guowei, a well-known scholar in modern times, is most famous in his literary creation and literary theory for his “Human Ci” and “Human Ci Hua”. The achievements of his Ci writing are in the development of realm; it is generally believed that Wang Guowei used philosophical principles in his Ci , Endowed “realm” with philosophical connotation, which is the difference between him and his predecessors, and also the difference from his contemporaries including Kuang Zhouyi. From the analysis of specific works, Wang Guowei’s poetry has mostly got rid of the clichés of expressing parting feelings and humiliation. What he wants to explore is the relationship between the essence of life and the tragic nature, and how to transcend or get rid of the tragic nature of life. . Wang Guowei’s academic influence is growing day by day. However, before the 1930s, Wang Guowei’s Ci theory was not to be seen, and the mainstream of the Ci circle was Kuang Zhouyi.

“Scattering on the Words in the World”, by Peng Yuping / Zhonghua Book Company / 2020

In 1904, Kuang Zhouyi formally published the first Cihua “Xianghaitangguan Cihua”, which was the first to put forward the theory of “heavy and clumsy”. In “Hui Feng Cihua”, which is the masterpiece of the genre-style Ci theory, there is also an explanation of “the inner meaning is the first, the illocutionary is the latter, especially the small flaws are too big”, which reflects its emphasis on ideological content and exquisiteness. Suspended ci propositions. Wang Guowei’s “Renjian Cihua” praised the poetry of the Five Dynasties and the Northern Song Dynasty, opposed the poetry of the Southern Song Dynasty, and rejected the poetry of the late Qing Dynasty. In related articles, Zhu Zumou and Kuang Zhouyi, who were the “four major poets of the late Qing Dynasty”, occasionally misrepresented. However, Peng Yuping put forward a new theory, thinking that Wang Kuang and Wang Kuang had similarities in the aesthetic orientation of poetry. Kuang Zhouyi revealed his “return to the Northern Song Dynasty” in the note to “A Study of Poets of Past Dynasties” instead of “returning to the Northern Song Dynasty”. “Persistence.

Are the Ci studies of Wang’s and Kuang’s antagonistic? Or, to put it another way, what exactly did Wang Guowei object to, and what did Kuang Zhou Yi “return”? At 7:30 pm on April 17, stay tuned for Professor Peng Yuping’s lecture “From Wang Guowei to Kuang Zhouyi: How We Intervene in Academic History” and his academic dialogue with Professor Huang Shizhong. “Southern Capital Live” will be broadcast live.

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