Star scientist Pan Linfeng picks cutting-edge China post over fading Oxbridge
After more than four years as a postdoctoral
researcher at Cambridge University's historic Cavendish Laboratory, rising star Pan Linfeng faced a career path choked by scarce permanent positions and salaries dwarfed by
China's aggressive investment in scientific talent
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Pan, 34, has already published more than 30 papers in prestigious journals such as Nature, Nature Catalysis, and Nature Communications, and accumulated more than 4,100 citations, according to Google Scholar.
But with a tenure at either Oxford or Cambridge as far away as ever, Pan abandoned the Cavendish, which has produced 30 Nobel laureates since it was established in 1871 as the world's first dedicated physics research institution.
This month, he left Britain's fading academic prestige to lead a cutting-edge renewable energy laboratory at Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU) – part of its Transformative Molecular Frontier Science Centre, which opened in 2020 and is already positioned as a world-class hub.
Pan – who earned a doctorate in chemistry from École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) in 2019, before joining the Cavendish in 2020 – began exploring opportunities in China after his 2024 paper was accepted by the top journal Nature.
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He looked into potential positions at universities in Suzhou, Hangzhou and Shanghai, before settling on a tenure-track associate professorship at SJTU.
'Currently, China is actively supporting young scientists, and the timing is ideal to return,' Pan told China Science Daily in 2024. 'The nation lacks advanced spectroscopic analysis for solar fuels – I aim to bridge this gap by establishing domestic labs with my international expertise.'
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