On November 3, the 2020 State Science and Technology Awards were conferred. The project led by Prof. Han Xiaodong from Faculty of Materials and Manufacturing won the second prize of the State Natural Science Award. It is the first time BJUT has won the honor as the first unit. Moreover, the project co-authored by Prof. Peng Yongzhen, the member of CAE, from Faculty of Environment and Life won the second prize of the State Technological Innovation Award.

Prof. Han Xiaodong, the first author of the award-winning project "Elastoplastic Mechanical Behavior and Atomic-level Mechanism of Face-centered Cubic Materials", leads a research team on in-situ electron microscopy. The team has conducted research on major scientific issues in the mechanical behavior of materials and their atomic-level mechanisms for nearly two decades, with the guidance of Prof. Zhang Ze, the member of CAS.

The team developed an original atomically-resolved in-situ characterization method for the mechanical behavior of materials. They put forward a new approach to improve the elasticity and plasticity of materials. This has been used in the nano-scale material design, and rated as one of the top ten S&T innovations amongst Chinese higher education institutions. In addition, the team established the correlation between the atomic-scale microstructure of materials and their mechanical properties, and proposed a new concept for designing materials with excellent mechanical properties. These findings were successfully applied in the manufactory industry, precisely, the batch preparation of bulk metal materials with high strength and strong plastic deformation capabilities.

Since 2004, the team has published more than 230 articles in major academic journals at home and abroad, including Science, Nature Materials, Nature Communications, Nano Letters, Physical Review Letters, Advanced Materials, and Acta Materialia. The team has also obtained more than 50 national invention patents and 6 international patents, and authorized more than 20 transfers.

Prof. Peng Yongzhen, the co-author of the award-winning project "Advanced Biological Nitrogen Removal Technology for Wastewater and Its Application", leads a research team on wastewater treatment. For more than three decades, they have carried out cutting-edge research on biological sewage treatment technology in response to China's major needs for water pollution control.

The team raised an overall technical idea for the advanced nitrogen removal fromurban wastewater. They invented a new process and method from external carbon sources, and developed a technical model for the synergy of in-situ utilization of sewage carbon sources and sludge reduction. They broke through the bottleneck of processing low-carbon-nitrogen-ratio wastewater for discharge up to the standard, energy saving, and consumption reduction. They also cooperated with enterprises to promote the transformation of the technological achievements.

Prof. Peng has been a pioneer in wastewater treatment. The number of Prof. Peng's publications and citations in the research area rank the first at home and abroad. The team has obtained more than 300 national invention patents and authorized more than 100 transfers. Their findings in biological wastewater treatment won three second prizes of National S&T Progress Award.