The Light of Mentors

Forging a Path of Innovation with Soul

A Tribute to Academician Liu Wenqing's Team, Co-writing the Chapter of an Industrial Powerhouse with the Spirit of Educators

On September 10, 2025, China celebrates its 41st Teachers' Day. The theme of this year's Teachers' Day is "Cultivating Teachers with the Spirit of Educators to Forge Souls, Composing a Magnificent Chapter in Building an Educational Power". As we pay tribute to the mentors who impart knowledge and educate people on the three-foot platform, we should also remember the "scientific research mentors" in the "special classroom" at the intersection of scientific research and industry — those who are guided by the spirit of educators and nurture industrial innovation with technological wisdom.

Guoke Hanhai has been deeply engaged in the laser monitoring field for more than ten years. From its tentative start to becoming an industry leader, it has always been accompanied and guided by such a "special mentor team" — Academician Liu Wenqing's team from the Anhui Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Hefei Institutes of Physical Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences. As early as 2010, the two parties established a joint venture with the original aspiration of "deep integration of production, education and research", initiating a journey of close cooperation. With the educator's spirit of "enlightening wisdom, nurturing hearts and teaching students in accordance with their aptitude", they have generously shared their expertise at every critical stage of Hanhai's initial establishment, overcoming difficulties and iterative upgrading. They have not only illuminated the company's path of innovation but also injected vibrant momentum into the construction of an educational power and an industrial powerhouse through the synergy of production, education and research.

Initial Stage: Sowing Seeds with "Enlightening Wisdom and Nurturing Hearts", Anchoring the Original Aspiration of Production-Education-Research Integration

When Hanhai was founded in 2010, the application of laser gas monitoring in domestic industrial scenarios was still a blank. We cherished the enthusiasm for industrial implementation but wandered aimlessly in the "no-man's land" of core technologies. It was at this time that Academician Liu Wenqing's team appeared like a "guiding mentor". By then, the academician team had been deeply engaged in the field of laser spectroscopy for decades, boasting profound scientific research accumulation and the educational sentiment of "writing papers on the land of the motherland".

Learning that Hanhai intended to promote laser technology to industrial safety scenarios, Academician Liu Wenqing personally led a team to investigate the enterprise. Just like an educator analyzing students' characteristics, he tailored and sorted out the R&D direction from three dimensions: "adaptability of technical principles, particularity of industrial scenarios, and forward-looking of market demand".

Academician Liu Wenqing's team broke down scientific research barriers and opened national-level laboratories, allowing Hanhai's R&D personnel to have close access to the core technology of TDLAS laser absorption spectroscopy. Faced with the puzzles encountered in prototype design, the academician team stationed in Hanhai's workshop continuously. They patiently disassembled the basic principles of laser wavelength calibration and the optimization logic of signal denoising algorithms like explaining key points in textbooks, guiding us to complete the prototype construction of the first "laboratory-level laser methane detector" with hands-on teaching. This effort of "enlightening wisdom and nurturing hearts" not only enabled Hanhai to anchor the direction of "independent R&D + industrial implementation" in the initial stage but also deeply rooted the seed of "scientific research serving industry" — this is a vivid practice of the educator's spirit of "cultivating the heart before educating people" in the field of production, education and research.

Critical Period: Strengthening Capabilities with "Overcoming Difficulties", Solving the "Chokepoint" Problems of the Industry

In 2017, Hanhai undertook the leakage monitoring project of the national pipeline network's natural gas long-distance transmission pipeline, encountering a "life-or-death test" of the industry. Traditional monitoring equipment requires power supply to operate, posing significant safety hazards in underground and flammable and explosive LNG scenarios. However, there was no mature solution for battery-free monitoring technology in China. At the critical moment, we and Academician Liu Wenqing's team immediately set up a special research group and established a joint laboratory, turning the project site into a "practical classroom" and demonstrating the responsibility of "daring to tackle tough problems and being good at solving new problems" in the educator's spirit.

Academician Liu Wenqing organized interdisciplinary seminars many times. Just like a mentor guiding students to solve difficult problems, he led the team to jump out of the mindset of "traditional powered monitoring". Hanhai's R&D personnel innovatively proposed the technical path of "passive laser + energy harvesting". Core members of the team stationed at the project site, repeatedly testing laser reflection modules of different materials under high summer temperatures and recording hundreds of sets of experimental data. Finally, they overcame the core problem of "stable transmission of laser signals in passive environments". During those days, they not only taught us specific technical solutions but also imparted the thinking method of "inferring technological breakthroughs from scene pain points" — just like a teacher teaching students "problem-solving ideas" rather than simply giving "answers". When the first passive laser monitoring terminal successfully operated on the long-distance transmission pipeline of the national pipeline network, realizing "accurate early warning without electricity", we not only broke through technical bottlenecks but also developed the ability to independently solve industrial problems in the process of "overcoming difficulties" — this is exactly the profound embodiment of the educator's spirit of "teaching others to fish".

Iteration Period: Leading Upgrading with "Visionary Insight", Expanding the Boundaries of Innovation

With the in-depth advancement of the "dual carbon" goal, the market demand for laser monitoring has upgraded from "safety early warning" to "accurate carbon emission measurement", and Hanhai is facing new challenges in technological iteration. At this time, Academician Liu Wenqing's team, with the wisdom of educators in "prospective education", took the lead in insight into industry trends, proposed the integration direction of "laser monitoring + AI algorithms", and led us to enter a new stage of technological upgrading.

The team deeply integrated the accumulated core technology of "simultaneous identification of multiple components of gases" with the tens of millions of industrial scene data accumulated by Hanhai, and jointly developed an AI risk identification system based on visual learning. This system can not only accurately detect the concentration of methane, carbon dioxide and other gases but also predict leakage trends through AI models, realizing the full-chain service of "monitoring + early warning + prediction".

In the Henan Jiaozuo Waste Incineration Power Plant project, this system achieved an industry achievement of "carbon emission data updated every 1 second with an error rate of less than 5%", providing key supporting data for carbon emission accounting.

Academician Liu Wenqing often said to us: "Technological innovation should 'reach for the sky and stand on the ground' — it should not only keep up with cutting-edge scientific research but also take root in industrial needs." This sentence has now become Hanhai's R&D criterion, guiding us to continuously expand the application of laser technology in new fields such as hydrogen energy safety and carbon footprint tracing.

This kind of foresight of "based on the present and looking to the future" is an extension of the educator's concept of "educating for the long-term" in the field of science and technology, enabling us to always be at the forefront of the industry in technological iteration.

Over more than ten years of cooperation, Academician Liu Wenqing's team has long surpassed the identity of "cooperator" and become the "scientific research mentor team" on Hanhai's growth path. With the spirit of educators as the soul, they not only impart technical skills but also cultivate the spirit of innovation; they not only help enterprises develop but also promote industrial upgrading.

On the occasion of the 41st Teachers' Day, Guoke Hanhai extends its highest respect to Academician Liu Wenqing's team! In the future, we will continue to take the academician team as an example, inherit the educator's spirit of "enlightening wisdom and nurturing hearts, overcoming difficulties, and having visionary insight", deepen the research in laser technology, strengthen the collaboration of production, education and research, and use better technical achievements to safeguard energy security and assist green development. In the journey of building an educational power and an industrial powerhouse, we will continue to write the magnificent chapter belonging to scientific and technological workers.

Happy Teachers' Day!