The Development Status and Development Direction of Scientific Instruments in China

Science begins with measurement. Scientific instruments are the source of information and an important part of the information industry. They have a tremendous role in promoting the development of the national economy, science and technology, public safety, and national defense construction. They are pillar industries and strategic industries for economic and social development. Modern scientific instruments are not only the prerequisite of knowledge innovation and technological innovation, but also one of the main contents of innovation research and an important embodiment of innovation achievements. Many branches of science are developed with the invention of certain scientific instruments. Scientific instruments and their technology are the cornerstones of modern science and industry. The level of development of scientific instruments marks the level of national innovation capabilities and the development of science and technology.

In the past two years, with the in-depth development of information science, life sciences, materials science, and nano sciences, the advancement of world scientific instrument disciplines and technologies has been advancing by leaps and bounds, new technologies have been introduced to the world, and new products have emerged. On the other hand, the global economic and social development has constantly put forward many new demands for technology and instrumentation, making scientific instrument research and application enter an unprecedented period of rapid development.

In terms of the strategic objectives and capital investment in the development of scientific instruments, developed countries have formulated their own development strategies and locked in their targets. They have dedicated input and have become conscious, policy-oriented, and targeted government actions. In the United States, for example, its overall goal is to maintain the leading position of the United States in the field of scientific instruments. In addition to policies that strongly encourage major instrument companies to increase R&D investment, the country also assists each through two foundations (NSF and NIH). Large companies develop scientific instruments. The U.S. Department of Energy and the Ministry of National Defense also have a large amount of capital investment each year. They also have clear goals and requirements, adopt horizontal issues similar to ours, and conduct research and development through contractual commissions.

All developed countries have developed advanced large-scale scientific instruments and experimental facilities and built world-class advanced experimental infrastructure platforms. They have become a strategic measure to create world-class research results and cultivate and attract outstanding talents.

Today's development of scientific instruments shows that instruments that detect atoms, molecules, and components are developing in the direction of versatility, automation, intelligence, and networking. Instruments for separation and analysis are being developed in the direction of multidimensional separation and analysis. Position, in-vivo, real-time, online, high-sensitivity, high-throughput, and high-selectivity directions; instrumentation for the detection of complex components in the direction of coupled analytical instruments; for environmental, energy, agricultural, food, clinical inspections Instruments are developed in the direction of specialization and miniaturization; sample pretreatment instruments are developed in a dedicated, rapid, and automated manner; instruments used in defense and life sciences are being developed toward integrated, miniature full-analysis systems; and analytical instruments that monitor industrial processes are online Analysis, in-situ analysis direction development.

From the point of view of manufacturing technology, the mechanical components of the instrument are developed in the direction of high-precision machining and miniaturization; the electrical components of the instrument are developing in the direction of integration and solid-state; the functional components and structural units of the instrument are developing in the direction of modularization; Adopt new technologies, new mechanisms, new materials, and new devices.

Scientific instrument is a high-tech product. It benefits from the latest results of adopting various cutting-edge technologies. At the same time, it also faces the challenge of continuous innovation and development of various cutting-edge technologies. It can be expected that with the development of life sciences, materials sciences, energy sciences, environmental sciences, and public safety sciences, as well as the constant emergence of new technologies, scientific instruments will also become multifunctional, miniaturized, miniaturized, automated, and intelligent. Aspects will continue to innovate.

The status quo of the development of scientific instruments in China When China began its reform and opening up, due to the impact of the market economy and the shackles of the state-owned system, the development of scientific instruments in China has experienced a period of low tide. Many large scientific instrument factories have been unable to make ends meet The scientific instrument industry once shrank significantly. In the early 1990s, the localization rate of scientific instruments was only 13%.

With the deepening of the reform of the state-owned economic system and the improvement of people’s understanding of the importance of developing scientific instruments, and the rise of private enterprises, coupled with the acceleration of the entire economic development, the country’s use of “scientific instruments” began from the Ninth Five-Year Plan period. "Research and development" was included in the scientific and technological research project, and gradually increased investment; the National Natural Science Foundation of China set up a special scientific instrument, the Chinese Academy of Sciences also set up a special project for scientific instrument innovation, and the situation has finally improved. Some state-owned analytical instrument factories on the brink of bankruptcy, through restructuring and restructuring, have emerged from the trough and have shown new vitality. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, a group of privately-owned analytical instrument companies developed rapidly. In recent years, annual sales have increased by more than 30%. Their products have been recognized by domestic users and have been partially Entering the international market, some of them have participated in the national "Ninth Five-Year Plan" and "Tenth Five-Year Plan" scientific instrument research projects, which have contributed to the improvement of China's scientific instrument level, and have transformed the main body of scientific and technological innovation to the enterprise. A big step.

Through the joint efforts of these instrument manufacturers and related scientific research workers, the development of scientific instruments in China has begun to take shape. From the geographical point of view, it is mainly composed of four regions, namely, scientific instruments in the Bohai Bay area centered on Beijing. Industrial belts; scientific instrument clusters in the Yangtze River Delta with Shanghai as the leader; scientific instrumentation industrialization bases in the Northeastern region based on Changchun and Dalian; and the newly emerging Pearl River Delta region represented by Shenzhen. At the end of the Ninth Five-Year Plan, the localization rate of scientific instruments centered on analytical instruments reached 30%. The research and development of scientific instruments and the development of industries began to gradually break out of the trough and enter a stage of rapid development. Some middle and low-end products have basically reached the level of similar foreign products: such as the field of spectrum analysis instruments, atomic fluorescence spectrometers with independent intellectual property rights, occupy the entire domestic instrument market; mid-range UV-visible spectrophotometer and atomic absorption spectrophotometer, in addition to meet domestic In addition to the needs of routine analysis, there are some exports. Of course, as a whole, China’s scientific instruments are still in their infants’ age. Taking the main analytical instruments in scientific instruments as an example, of the more than 90 kinds of analytical instruments used today, there are only 20 kinds of existing products in our country. 1/3, there are about 80 kinds of special instruments for life sciences, only 16 kinds of commercial products in China, and more than 10 kinds are under research. However, the market prospect of China's scientific instruments is very broad. It is estimated that the total amount of newly purchased scientific instruments will exceed RMB 100 billion in the period from 2006 to 2015. This does not include the number of new instruments that need to be replaced every 5 to 7 years.

In short, through the "Ninth Five-Year Plan" and "Tenth Five-Year Plan" research, China's scientific instrument industry has achieved great development and has achieved a number of achievements with independent intellectual property rights. However, for a long time foreign well-known instrument companies have taken advantage of technology and brands to occupy most of the domestic high-end markets, especially high-end spectrometers, chromatographs, mass spectrometers, electron microscopes, nuclear magnetic, biochemical and life science instruments. Depends on imports.

Modern scientific instruments have stepped out of the laboratories and have played an increasingly important role in the fields of social economy, sustained cultural development, and national security and social stability. They have also begun to break through the instruments. The traditional boundaries of the machine (such as the provision of chromatographs, PCR amplification, etc.) have become novel material production methods. However, there is still a wide gap between the level of science and technology and industry in the field of scientific instruments in China and the world's advanced level. We must seriously consider and vigorously promote various strategic and tactical problems that revitalize China's scientific instrument industry and concrete measures that should be taken decisively.

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