Page 43 - WYSS2022 总结册-1

《重大基础性发现需要开放的基础科学》
Open Basic Science is Needed for Significant and
Fundamental Discoveries

迈克尔·莱维特在报告中指出，基础科学非常重要，经常被叫做基础科学的意外发
现，这和可以提前去计划的应用科学不一样。它首先需要有年轻人在其中致力于发
展，并且有非常多的年轻人可以致力于此，但是大家都不知道谁会最后发现这个突破。
人类健康的未来这个话题，要从新冠引擎的研究说起。一开始疫情传播的时候，有
一个超级传播者，这些超级传播者很早的时候就受到了感染，然后他们会快速感染
身边其他的密接。这对于防控的启示意义在于，要么就完全没有感染，要么就有非常
快速的传播。所以，要去进行一个渐进式的控制是非常困难的。证明科学研究是真
理需要一百年的时间，但是大家以史为鉴，这样才能更加明白未来前进的方向。

Michael Levitt pointed out in his presentation that basic science is very important and it’s
often referred to as accidental discoveries, which is different from applied science can be
planned in advance. He noted that young people need to engage in it for development and
many more can work on it, but no one would know who will discover a breakthrough in
the end. The topic of the future of human health should start with the research on engines
driving the COVID-19 pandemic. When the pandemic started to spread, there must be a
super-spreader, who got infected at an early stage and then quickly infected other close
contacts. The inspiration for prevention and control is that either there’s no infection at all, or
there’s rapid transmission. Therefore, it’s very difficult to control it progressively. It may take
a century to prove the truth of a scientific research result, but learning from history helps us
better understand the future direction.

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