Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Peer review was a job without glory.
First of all, this was an unpaid job. Well, it was paid in things that were unrelated to money, such as journal acknowledgments, positions in the editorial department, free access to journals, discounts on thesis processing charges, etc.
Secondly, being able to judge whether something esoteric was correct or not, was very difficult in and of itself.
If it were a normal proposition, it was fine, but when it came to a world-class problem like the Yang-Mills equations, there was no room for error. Every line in the thesis had to be carefully reviewed by reviewers.
The reason why people would accept this job, other than for the reputation of being a reviewer for a well-known journal, was more out of social goodwill and a sense of purpose for being a scientific research gatekeeper.
For a scholar who had made a name for himself, Professor Fefferman’s motivation for accepting this review was probably the latter reason. However, when he received the thesis, he threw all of these reasons out of the window.
Starting from the first line of calculations, the calculation process was like a flow of water. Like magic, it instantly grabbed his attention.
Especially the paper’s understanding of the differential geometry of partial differential equations, as well as the application of the L Manifold, it was so subtle that he could hardly believe it.
He couldn’t believe that a theory that was only two years young could develop to such a mature level.
“This is incredible.”
Professor Fefferman spent around fifteen minutes just on the first page. He couldn’t help but feel emotional.
He felt a little regretful earlier that his holiday was going to be interrupted.
But now, there wasn’t an ounce of regret in his heart.
The time in his office slowly passed by, and the sky outside the window gradually darkened.
Wei Wen was sitting at another desk in the office. When he finally found the solution, he took a deep breath. He stretched his back and felt relaxed.
He was about to stand up and go to the cafeteria for some dinner when he noticed Professor Fefferman sitting nearby. He was still sitting in the same position while reading the thesis in his hand. Professor Fefferman would occasionally write something on a piece of draft paper.
Wei Wen hesitated for a bit and couldn’t help but ask curiously, “Did Professor Lu… prove it?”
When Professor Fefferman heard this, he stopped writing.
He placed the thesis on the table and picked up his lukewarm cup of coffee. After a while, he replied thoughtfully, “I can’t make a decision on something this important alone…”
Professor Fefferman looked at the thesis on his desk and paused for a second. He then continued to speak, “However, in my opinion, he probably did it.”
After completing the proof of the existence of a solution to the Yang-Mills equations, Lu Zhou imported the content of the draft paper into his computer. After editing it, he sent it to the email of the editorial department of Annual Mathematics.
There was no hiccup at all; the thesis quickly passed the reviews by technical editors and went into the peer review stage.
Lu Zhou didn’t know who the reviewer was. At least, he wouldn’t know until the thesis was published.
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Before importing it into his computer, he already checked the entire proof process, he was more than 90% confident that his proof was correct. Regardless of what the reviewer thought, in his eyes, this problem was already solved.
Lu Zhou verified that the thesis had entered the peer review stage and then left it alone. He began his next research phase.
In fact, proving the existence of a solution to the holy grail Yang-Mills equations was only the first step. He was far from solving the entire problem. Before he could begin researching the Yang-Mills existence and mass gap, he had to find a general solution to this complex equation.
From a mathematical perspective, there was no doubt that finding a general solution was much more difficult than finding a proof of a general solution. Using his knowledge of the Navier–Stokes equations was not though.
Lu Zhou didn’t plan on going through another retreat before he had an idea of how to solve this problem. He had been searching for other people’s theses on arXiv to see if he could find some inspiration from other people’s research.
Unfortunately, the results weren’t ideal.
Even though the Yang-Mills equations played an important role in the modern gauge theory field, very few people did research on the general nonlinear partial differential equation solution. Even though there were some interesting ideas, the researches often weren’t deep enough.
This meant that he had to rely on himself for this part of the research as well…
The last Wednesday in April…
Lu Zhou finished his computational materials science lecture and walked out of the classroom while holding a textbook.
He was thinking about the Yang-Mills equations while walking toward the stairway. A middle-aged man shouted his name and ran toward him.
“Please wait a second, Professor Lu.”
Lu Zhou stopped in his footsteps and turned around. He had a suspicious look on his face.
“Who are you?”
The middle-aged professor panted and smiled as he said, “I’m Zhang Zhiongqing, from the physics department… We met in my physics class last time.”
“Oh yeah.” Lu Zhou immediately remembered this name. He then said cheerfully, “Professor Zhang, what’s up?”
Seeing that Lu Zhou still remembered him, Zhang Zhiongqing awkwardly smiled and said, “Here’s the thing, you gave my students a lecture regarding the strong interaction, right? A lot of students felt unfortunate that they couldn’t listen to your lecture. Quantum mechanics is also a very difficult undergraduate subject, and it requires a certain level of mathematical literacy. The physics department leaders had a chat, and we want to ask if you have time to give a lecture on quantum mechanics.”
“Oh, sure, no problem.” Lu Zhou smiled and said, “Is this Saturday good?”
Zhang Zhiongqing smiled and said, “Sounds good! The dean said that we can do it any time you like. Then it’s a deal! On behalf of the physics department, I would like to thank you.”
Lu Zhou: “No need to be so polite, I quite like giving lectures.”
Even though teaching undergraduate students couldn’t directly help him solve problems, it could give him inspiration, which he couldn’t get from his retreats.
Zhang Zhiongqing smiled and said, “After all, you’re so busy with research, and you’re still taking the time to teach undergraduate students, we’re very grateful…”
“Lu Zhou!”
A loud voice was heard from across the hallway, interrupting the conversation.
The two men stopped their conversation and looked toward the direction of the voice. They saw Academician Lu, who was wearing a gray coat, walking toward them.
Lu Zhou was surprised to see Academician Lu. He was about to greet him, but before he could speak, the old man asked excitedly, “You wrote that thesis?”
Lu Zhou was stunned.
“Which thesis?”
Academician Lu didn’t even catch his breath. “The proof of the existence of a solution to the Yang-Mills equations!”
Zhang Zhiongqing nearly choked on his spit.
Yang-Mills equations?!
The f*ck?