In the Institute of Elemento-organic Chemistry of Nankai University, a white-haired, plainly dressed old professor is leading several graduate students in experiments. The 87-year-old man is a senior expert in the field of pesticide science in China - Li Zhengming, Academician of Chinese Academy of Engineering, Professor of Nankai University. Recently, the research group led by him has been approved to participate in the new task for the National Key R&D Program Agricultural Biological Drug Molecular Targets Discovery and Drug Molecular Design, which means they will undertake the development of future ecological pesticides of China and face  new challenges from the forefront of international pesticide science and technology with the purpose of facilitating China growth into becoming an international pesticide manufacturing power.

Li Zhengming’s constant pursuit of teaching excellence and scientific research for over 60 years forms a portrayal of his unremitting efforts to strive for national industry and serve the country with scientific research. He always works to combine basic research with national needs, scientific research with technological innovation, development research with industrialization, and persists in developing pesticide products with our own intellectual property rights.

It is an arduous road to rectify the reputation of China's pesticides. The creation of new pesticides is a systematic, interdisciplinary, and cross-domain project. There are tremendous demands made upon of time and money in the development of new pesticides. The environmental and ecological safety tests require large amounts of each, and basic research takes at least five years. Toxicological environmental ecological evaluations need to be repeated hundreds of times; the R&D and registration is a process that requires more than ten years. In the face of these difficulties, Li Zhengming said firmly, “Someone has to do the work and take the risks. If no one does it, China's own original innovation will never be made. And we will always be subject to others.” After years of perseverance and unremitting efforts, Li Zhengming has led his team to achieve significant scientific and technological innovations, and successfully created products such as the ultra-efficient green herbicide Monosulfuron (Monosulfuryl), with independent intellectual property rights in China, making China the fourth country with the ability to independently create new herbicides after the United States and other developed countries. Through the joint efforts of several generations of Chinese pesticide researchers, such as Li Zhengming, the comprehensive strength of Chinese pesticide science and technology has undergone drastic changes.

When planning the direction of scientific research, it is important to emphasize the potential application value of research results to the national economy, paying attention to the real demand situation and the actual situation in China, so as to make green pesticides of high quality and low cost that the people can afford. Li Zhengming said so, and has been doing so  in his scientific research work. Li Zhengming recalled that when he was conducting research on insect pheromones in China, insect pheromones combined the advantages of biological and chemical control, which was not only a new research direction for pest control, but also a practical exploration aimed at the frontier of pesticide research globally. However, there was a mismatch between the prospect of this research and the actual application at that time due to the high price of the product and the complexity of the operation. Therefore, he chose to carry out the research direction according to the national conditions, and led the team to research  a new process of FXN, a highly effective fungicide, finally overcoming the technical difficulties after more than four years of hard work. After the product was released to market, both the quality and the effect was found to be better than international standards, while the cost is only a quarter of the cost of imported pesticides.

Li Zhengming led his team to win the First Prize of National Scientific and Technological Progress, the Second Prize of National Technological Invention, the Tianjin Science and Technology Major Achievement Award and other awards. Today, at the age of 87, he still sticks to the front line of scientific research. His colleagues can often see him in the laboratory leading students in innovative research.

Science knows no bounds. And Li Zhengming's scientific research career still continues.