Zhuhai City Acquires Two Nobel Laureates for Biomedical Institute

Two Nobel laureates, Dr. Aaron Ciechanover and Dr. Ada Yonath, are confirmed to move to Zhuhai, South China's Guangdong Province, to work on research and development for the Zhuhai International Biomedical Institute over the next few years.

The two Israeli biochemists shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2009, with Ciechanover also winning the prize in 2004.

Ciechanover, who is going through the administrative procedures for long-term residence in Zhuhai, discovered the method of how cells degrade and recycle proteins using ubiquitin. He is currently a member of the National Academy of Sciences of the U.S.A. and went to Zhuhai primarily to establish the institute.

Yonath, who has been dubbed the "Marie Curie of Israel," is an authority on the structure of ribosomes, the organelles responsible for building proteins in the cell.

The two biomedical experts are among the respected scientists, including eight other Nobel laureates, who have been invited by the city of Zhuhai to work in the Zhuhai National Hi-Tech Industrial Development Zone.

The program is led by Huang Ziwei, professor of the School of Life Sciences at Tsinghua University in Beijing. It will operate based on the marketization business model, with the government providing necessary subsidies.

According to Wang Quing-li, deputy mayor of Zhuhai City, the working hours of the resident Nobel laureates will be regulated, and they will be provided with housing and living subsidies.

The program is in line with other policies that the city government has been implementing since 2013 to cultivate talent by providing people who are highly educated with up to 24-month long housing subsidies, in which undergraduate students can receive a stipend of 200 yuan ($32) per month, graduate students 400 yuan ($64), and PhD students 800 yuan ($129).

All the results and findings of the Nobel laureates and other scientists in the program will belong to the Chinese government.