Gao Shuji, Director of the State Key Laboratory of Marine Resource Utilization in the South China Sea at Hainan University, has spent 32 years researching land-ocean carbon and nitrogen cycling and climate change. He often illustrates expertise figuratively: “Groundwater storage is like money in your pocket. Pumping it costs money, while rainfall infiltration puts money back in your pocket.”
In 1995, after receiving his doctorate from Taiwan University, Gao Shuji devoted himself to research on the carbon cycling in the alpine rivers of the Taiwan Orogen and the impact of typhoons. In 2007, he received the Academia Sinica Early-Career Investigator Research Achievement Award in the Taiwan region, becoming the only recipient in the field of oceanography between 1996 and 2010. At the age of 45, Gao Shuji moved to the Chinese mainland and expanded his research into ocean nitrogen cycling in Xiamen. He established the state’s first laboratory capable of comprehensive research on ocean nitrogen cycling, and the techniques developed there have had a broad influence on other research teams in China. “One cannot stand still forever. The development of the team and platform is what truly matters to me,” he said.
In 2021, in response to the call of the country to build the Hainan Free Trade Port, he served as the director of the State Key Laboratory of Marine Resource Utilization in the South China Sea. In Gao’s opinion, Hainan Province and the China South Sea are “uncut jade”, worthy of the utmost dedication from scientific and technical workers.
He and his team focus on fields such as ocean carbon and nitrogen cycling, climate change, changes in environmental effects and marine ecosystem security. His team has achieved two noteworthy results. First, they pioneered the use of carbon-14 isotope in the study of river particulate organic carbon. This research integrates present-day processes with paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic records, linking different zones along the land-ocean continuum. Its findings provide a basis for the estimation of regional and global river carbon flux, and have been widely cited by scholars worldwide in top journals including Nature and Science. Second, based on the response to global change and climate feedbacks, they proposed a new theory—the climate-regulating function of the marine biological pump, which is applicable to forecasting the evolution of the ocean under global warming and offers a scientific foundation for formulating carbon neutrality strategies.
As for education, Gao holds that there should be available to all, regardless of background, and that students should be taught in accordance with their aptitude. He believes that teaching students is like taking care of children—it requires refined nurturing. To his students, Professor Gao is always willing to share every bit of his knowledge with them: he first helps students identify their area of interest, and then spares no effort to support them. Gao Shuji often tells his students, “You should strive to be not only ‘smart’ scientists, but also ‘warm-hearted’ people. Academic study is a lighthouse, and humanity is its warmest glow.” After graduation, some of his students have stayed in the laboratory, continuing research on ocean nitrogen cycling, and some have set out on scientific expeditions in the deep sea, becoming seeds sown on the front line of marine research. “In Hainan, ” he said, “I am committed not only to doing scientific research but also to nurturing new generations of marine scientists.”
Original link: https://www.peopleapp.com/column/30047597100-500005973863
Translated by He Xueying
Proofread by Zhang Falian
