After Yang Ping established the "New Adjuvant" project team, across the ocean, in the United States, the meeting room of a company's strategic analysis department.

The enormous round floor-to-ceiling windows framed the city's skyline drawn by skyscrapers, with the indoor temperature consistently maintained at a comfortable 22 degrees Celsius, and the air purifier operating smoothly.

An internal briefing on global vaccine adjuvant research dynamics was being held.

The PPT on the large circular screen turned to a new page, titled "Monitoring Potential Technological Trends in the Asia-Pacific Region," with the basic information of Yang Ping's project team prominently displayed—a somewhat rudimentary list of members, along with somewhat youthful photos of Jiang Jitong, Chu Xiaoxiao, and others, and the highlighted "Five hundred million RMB (approximately seventy million USD) funding."

The presenter was a young analyst wearing gold-rimmed glasses, exuding a keen aura. He was about to proceed with the next topic when he was interrupted by an attendee.

"Wait a minute, Jack."

A middle-aged man sitting at the other end of the long table spoke. He was Zoan, the senior vice president in charge of vaccine business.

He leaned slightly forward, pointing his finger across the smooth tabletop, lightly tapping Yang Ping's name on the screen, the corner of his mouth curving into a teasing smile, "Can you elaborate on this project team? A name we have virtually no impression of, with five..." He paused, his eyes scanning over the photos of Chu Xiaoxiao and others, his tone carrying a hint of playfulness, "fresh-looking doctors seemingly just out of college, aiming to develop groundbreaking new adjuvants?"

He picked up a custom metal coffee cup from the table, gently stirring the black coffee inside, the cup clinking with a crisp sound, "Forgive my candor, but this sounds less like a serious strategic analysis report and more like a synopsis of a science fiction novel."

A few restrained chuckles sounded in the meeting room, and the atmosphere turned somewhat subtle.

Another senior Asian scientist, Dr. Xu, adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose, speaking with relative seriousness: "Mr. Zoan, I must remind you, Professor Yang Ping is a Nobel laureate, a Nobel laureate! The founder of the Spatial Orientation Gene Theory."

He repeated emphasizing the Nobel laureate status to correct Zoan's misunderstanding of Yang Ping.

In such a company internal meeting, Dr. Xu would never have dared to argue with Zoan before, but now it was different. Yang Ping's Nobel Prize gave him a certain confidence to confront people like Zoan.

"Nobel Prize? Is that so? I don't know him." Zoan shrugged, "Even if he is, immunology, especially adjuvant research, is a completely different and extremely complex field. We're dealing with the body's most sophisticated defense system, with historically high failure rates. We, along with our competitors, have invested billions of dollars and spent decades, often with teams of hundreds, yet most advancements have been limited to incremental improvements and optimizations in classic adjuvant systems like aluminum adjuvants and oil emulsions, with new adjuvants being exceptionally rare."

Zoan put down his coffee cup, spreading his hands as he once again looked at the screen photo of Chu Xiaoxiao, with her student-like appearance but a focused gaze, "So, I'm very curious, and I find it quite absurd. What makes them think, like this young girl doctor, and a few possibly just-graduated young scientists, they can design molecules superior to all our top-notch teams?" He shook his head, his expression as if discussing an unrealistic fantasy, "Courageous but meaningless."

Dr. Xu was now not intimidated by Zoan at all: "Many scientific breakthroughs are made when scientists are young; age erodes innovation while breeding a vanity-ridden arrogance."

His words carried underlying messages, obviously mocking Zoan, who was now over fifty years old.

Zoan turned to look at Dr. Xu with a look of disgust; when did this Asian become so audacious?

Analyst Jack quickly added: "Based on the intelligence we currently have, they are indeed just starting, with their current work focused on the most basic molecular cloning and vector construction stages."

"See," Zoan leaned back in his chair, his tone relaxed, "when they eventually manage to assemble their first candidate molecule and proceed to in vitro functional validation, they'll realize the chasm between ideals and reality. I believe this project is not worth committing excessive resources to; let's move on!"

"You will pay dearly for your arrogance. It's becoming apparent that our company is no longer young, gradually entering its twilight years." Dr. Xu spoke with a tone of regret.

...

Almost simultaneously, in another high-level meeting room of the vaccine department of a European company.

The atmosphere here was more technology-focused, with most attendees being core scientists and management staff from the R&D line. The projection screen displayed similar technology monitoring information.

"…In summary, the technical concept of this Chinese team is very bold, one might even say quite radical." Reporting was a female scientist around forty years old, using a laser pointer to highlight keywords like "de novo protein enhancer design" and "modular linkage" on the PPT, "They're attempting to bypass existing adjuvant frameworks, starting entirely from fundamental logic to rationally design protein components, akin to building blocks, using specific linkers to precisely control intracellular signaling pathways of antigen-presenting cells. Theoretically, this approach is very elegant and highly appealing."

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