Technological innovation rejuvenates old industrial base

A series of scientific research and development achievements driven by technological innovation has rejuvenated Jilin Province in northeast China — an old industrial base of China.

The CRRC Changchun Railway Vehicles Co., Ltd. is a key player in China’s high-speed train manufacturing. From the Beijing-Zhangjiakou intercity railway in north China, and from the Beijing Winter Olympics to the 19th Asian Games in east China’s Hangzhou City, technological innovation conducted by the company has set China’s high-speed train models as frontrunners worldwide.

“At the beginning of the design of the Fuxing model high-speed trains for the Beijing–Zhangjiakou intercity railway, we made 42 plans for the locomotive, reviewed them 316 times, drafted 5,289 structural sketches, and updated four versions of electric drawings which amounted to nearly 10,000 pieces of paper. Then finally, we developed the world’s first high-speed train with an automatic driving speed of 350 kilometers per hour,” said Ma Jingwen, engineer with CRRC Changchun Railway Vehicles Co., Ltd.

Exploring space has been an unremitting pursuit for whole humankind. A group of scientists in Jilin have developed an imaging technology for space X-ray, extreme ultraviolet and far ultraviolet waveband, allowing researchers to monitor specific bands that naked eyes cannot see and form images, and making space weather forecast more accurate.

The advanced technology has been applied in multiple fields, such as meteorological satellite making and the Chang’e-6 lunar exploration mission.

“We are now able to see what human eyes can’t see. For example, we can see the sun [with the technique] and know its temperature change in millions of degrees Celsius. By doing so, we can also know the change of the sun earlier, forecasting the future space weather,” said Chen Bo, deputy chief engineer with the Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics and Physics (CIOMP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

New technologies and materials for satellites have been developed as well, making lighter satellites and batch production possible.

The latest Jilin-1 Gaofen 06A satellite only weights 20 kilograms, one 20th of the initial one.

“We’ve been working relentlessly in development and research, as well as technological innovations, which has led to reductions of the manufacturing costs of satellites, as well as their size and weight,” said Zhang Xiaolei, director of the general office of the Changguang Satellite Technology Co., Ltd.

For now, there are 108 Jilin-1 satellites in orbit. They have been providing accurate data support for agriculture, forestry and urban planning with their high-resolution and wide coverage satellite remote sensing images.