The Club PUBlication 06/09/2025

China steps into gap for scientists
“The United States is shooting itself in the foot,” a researcher says.
By VIVIAN WANG The New York Times

​HANGZHOU, CHINA - China was already scoring wins in its rivalry with the United States for scientific talent. It had drawn some of the world's best researchers to its campuses, people decorated with Nobel Prizes, MacArthur "Genius" grants and seemingly every other academic laurel on offer.

Now the Trump administration's policies might soon bolster China's efforts.

Under President Donald Trump, the United States is slashing the research funding that helped establish its reputation as the global leader in science and technology. The president is also attacking the country's premier universities, and trying to limit the enrollment of international students.

Scientists from China are under particular pressure, as U.S. officials have said that they may pose a national security threat by funneling valuable knowledge to China. Chineseborn scientists have been investigated or even arrested. Last week, the Trump administration said it would work to "aggressively revoke" the visas of Chinese students in "critical fields."

As a result, many scholars are looking elsewhere. And Chinese institutions have been quick to try to capitalize.

Universities in Hong Kong and Xi'an said they would offer streamlined admission to transfer students from Harvard University.

An ad from a group with links to the Chinese Academy of Sciences welcomed "talents who have been dismissed by the U.S. NIH," or National Institutes of Health.

"The United States is shooting itself in the foot," said Zhang Xiaoming, an anatomy expert who last year left the Baylor College of Medicine, in Texas, to lead the medical education program at Westlake University, in the tech hub of Hangzhou.

"Since I went to the United States more than 30 years ago, so much of its research has been supported by foreigners, including many Chinese," said Zhang, who emphasized that he was speaking for himself, not his employer. "Without foreigners, at least in the field of scientific research, they can't go on."

On its own, China had become more attractive to scientists in recent years because of the huge investments the country has made in research.

Westlake is a prime example.
Established in 2018 by several high-profile scientists who had returned to China from the West, Westlake's campus exudes technological advancement.

A spaceshiplike tower looms over rows of research laboratories. Computing centers and animal testing facilities cluster around a central lawn, in a shape designed to evoke a biological cell.

In its main academic building, portraits of dozens of professors are on display — all of whom were recruited from overseas.

Recruitment notices advertise high compensation, in line with those at top foreign universities.

Between 2010 and 2021, nearly 12,500 scientists of Chinese descent left the United States for China, according to a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

More than half of them left between 2017 and 2021.

Multiple Chinese-born scientists — both those who had returned to China, and those still in the U.S. — emphasized that they did not want to get entangled in politics. They were just trying to do good work.

The simple fact was, many agreed, that it was increasingly easier to do so in China.

"It's hard to survive in America. And China is developing so fast," said Fu Tianfan, 32, an artificial intelligence researcher who left Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in December to join Nanjing University.

"Whether it was the best choice," he said, "it may take some time to say."