Chapter 244 I Didn't Hear You Clearly
From as early as the 1950's, it was known that scientific research placed heavy emphasis on intelligence compilation. China established the Institute of Information Science and later changed its name to the Institute of Scientific and Technological Information. It was similar for the other countries as well. Special agencies were set up to keep a close eye on scientific and technological literature from all over the world to find information that could be utilized.
Zhou Qingfeng had written a dissertation… Or more accurately, had copied a dissertation and published it in the school journal. However, he was still worried about it. After all, scientific research was a field that required references and citations. Flaws might appear if one was fully attentive when reading through the dissertation.
Due to his inexperience in that particular area, Zhou Qingfeng decided to use Xu Guoqiang's name when he submitted his dissertation. It was only after the dissertation was submitted that he found out that he had been wasting his time. The posting of scientific journals was actually divided into several grades. No one actually paid attention to the school journals as it contained a lot of meaningless trivia, such as poetry written by the students.
What should I do then?
However, Zhou Qingfeng soon realized that school journal was his only platform to publish his dissertations. He was not qualified yet to publish in a professional-level journal as he still lacked a certain degree of knowledge. To make things worse, no one was there to guide him step by step on how to improve his dissertation.
Hence, Zhou Qingfeng could only spend an entire month on reading books and conducting mini-experiments. Then he tried his best to think of every possible way to earn a large sum of money. Early this morning, Howard suddenly appeared in the warehouse of the laboratory.
He came alone and he did not mention why he was there. He kept throwing glances at the interior of the warehouse as if he were going to discover a major secret. Although this area was labeled as a laboratory, it looked more like a waste shelter than what it was meant to be.
Howard strode forward as if he were a starving wolf. He stared at his surroundings like an eagle and even sniffed around like a hound in order to uncover anything suspicious. However, everything seemed to be normal…...
The ground was quite clean, but the mental state of all the personnel did not seem to be good. Howard ran around the entire warehouse several times, but no one even bothered to pay attention to him. I really can't see how that astounding dissertation is actually related to this miserable warehouse!
When Howard received the phone call from the United States early in the morning, he instantly lost his desire to sleep. He wondered what was happening as everything was just too weird for him.
Howard then searched the internet for Zhou Qingfeng's dissertation according to the information provided by Hopkins Medical Center. Since the publication of scientific journals was usually delayed, the number of citations to the paper was still yet to be determined. However, in the current Information Age, the dissertation had instantly gained an incredible amount of popularity.
Howard quickly calculated a rough figure after looking at the praises on Zhou Qingfeng's dissertation from various professional science forums. The entire dissertation, which only contained around 2000 words, had obtained at least thirty citations from other papers in the world's top journals within two months.
The number of citations was something similar to the number of likes in social media. Whenever other people come out with a paper that was based on your dissertation, you will get one 'like'. In other words, Zhou Qingfeng had already reached the passing mark by obtaining over thirty likes from different top journals. What was notable was that Zhou Qingfeng managed to obtain thirty citations within a mere two months. This meant that the figure might grow even higher in the future.
God, are you kidding me?
Not long after dawn, Howard, who felt extremely angry at that instance, broke into Xu Guoqiang's biochemical laboratory. He thought that he would be seeing a modern laboratory filled with high-end equipment and a large number of lab personnel. He also thought that Xu Guoqiang would be extremely proud of their current situation as the laboratory that managed to publish an internationally-renowned dissertation.
However, he found out that the laboratory was nothing other than a deserted and quiet waste shelter. In fact, the laboratory was indescribably shabby. Other than Zhou Qingfeng who spared no effort while reading the books, the entire laboratory was filled with the atmosphere of failure.
A world-famous dissertation was written in this place? No way!
"How did you…… How did you guys do that?" Howard could not suppress the doubt in his mind. Hence, he pulled the daydreaming Yan Tao aside and whispered his question in the latter's ear.
Yan Tao looked at Howard who wandered around in the abandoned warehouse, and he only managed to recognize him after quite a while. At first, he felt that this person might be looking for Xu Guoqiang, and he thought that it was better for him to not approach the person so that he would not get himself into any trouble. However, he soon felt that something was not right when the person kept throwing glances at the entire laboratory.
"Uh huh……" Yan Tao subconsciously straightened his back and cleared his throat when he sensed Howard's doubt. As a sharp-witted man, his intuition told him that something was definitely going on. However, he too did not know what had actually happened.
I'm not afraid! Steady…… Steady……!
"Actually… it's just our day-to-day routine." Yan Tao then gave a perfunctory nod even though he still had not figured out what had happened. The foreigner asked me, 'How did you do that?' Could it be that some of the changes we made here have drawn his attention? But the biggest change we've made here is…… cleaning up the warehouse. "We raised some funds. That's why we managed to pull this off."
However, Howard interpreted his words as something completely different. Day-to-day routine? No way! So your day-to-day routine is to come up with internationally-recognized dissertations? Do you really think that's normal? Modesty, this must be the unique type of modesty that only the Chinese possess!
Howard then took another big breath before saying, "Are you guys working extremely hard in order to raise some funds?"
Yan Tao thought to himself, Aren't you just talking nonsense? The floor might still be full of rubbish and cobwebs if it weren't for Zhou's 80,000 yuan. Even then, the work is still far from being complete. "Yes, we still lack some funding. Otherwise, we can definitely do it even better."
Oh... Howard nodded as he then said, "I too wish that you guys can achieve even greater achievements. Do you guys by any chance need some help? Your ability has been recognized by everyone, and hence, I am willing to assist you guys financially on behalf of the Hopkins Medical Center in the United States. All you need to do is transfer over some of your rights."
What? We're getting recognized by the foreigners because of cleaning this stupid warehouse? Yan Tao felt that something was not right. However, he still asked subconsciously, "How much funding will we be getting?"
"Fifty million…… U.S. dollars."
Yan Tao instantly felt that his heart had stopped beating. His legs sunk under him, and he would have fallen for sure had Howard not supported him. He then rushed toward Howard and hugged his thigh.
He looked at Howard's eyes in a daze and asked, "Can you please say it again? I didn't hear you clearly."