The night before the college entrance exam results were released, I redeemed my Peking University ad

Superconductivity at room temperature?

Academician Zhou snatched the student's phone, frantically swiping the screen while muttering "Impossible, impossible..."

The moment the live stream loaded, he saw the boy in the picture wearing a white lab coat, holding a welding torch in one hand and a target in the other, smiling at the camera.

The flame from the welding torch danced on that young face, reflecting an unnaturally bright pair of eyes.

As Academician Zhou stared into those eyes, a chill suddenly ran down his spine.

Those eyes... are the same as when the boy stood on the podium in the Great Hall of the People half a month ago!

No way?

An inexplicable unease welled up in Academician Zhou's heart.

He turned his phone volume up to the maximum, his fingers unconsciously gripping the armrests of the chair.

……

at the same time.

Peking University, Department of Materials Science and Engineering.

Academician Chen, the retired emperor, was holding a project review meeting in the department's conference room. The presenter was a young associate professor, and the dense data and charts on the PPT made him drowsy.

He leaned back in his chair, tapping his fingers rhythmically on the armrest, already planning which cafeteria to have for lunch.

Then his assistant pushed the door open, quickly walked to his side, leaned down and whispered something in his ear.

The pen in Academician Chen's hand fell to the table with a "thud," rolled twice, and stopped next to the ceramic teacup in front of him.

"Room-temperature superconductivity?"

He blurted it out, his voice so loud that the entire conference room fell silent.

The presenter stopped flipping through the slides, and all the teachers in the room turned to look at him. Some of them looked particularly comical as the blue light from the PPT reflected off their glasses.

Without bothering to explain, Academician Chen grabbed the phone on the table and began rapidly typing on the screen.

When he entered the live broadcast room, the academician's lips twitched.

Everyone else in the meeting room also took out their phones, and the review meeting turned into a live-streamed movie screening by Ji Bai.

……

School of Mathematical Sciences.

Academician Wang was grading a paper in his office when his phone suddenly vibrated several times.

He took off his reading glasses, opened the message, and saw it was a WeChat message from Ji Baifa.

It was just one sentence: "Old Wang, come watch my live stream! Today I'm doing a hand-made room-temperature superconductivity demonstration!"

Below is a link to TikTok.

Old Wang wiped his glasses.

That's right!

Room temperature superconductivity!

It's not high temperature, it's room temperature!

What is this kid up to?

When Mr. Wang entered the live stream, he found that the barrage of comments was so numerous that it caused the stream to lag, and the screen was filled with question marks and exclamation marks that the image was almost completely obscured.

He leaned back in his chair, held his phone an arm's length away, stared at the boy in the white coat on the screen, and suddenly smiled.

This kid actually looks quite respectable in a white coat.

Academician Li, Director Lin, Director Zhang... these academic giants who usually wield great influence in their respective fields all did the same thing at this moment: clicked into Ji Bai's live stream.

Some were waiting to see the joke, some harbored a sliver of unspoken expectation, and most were simply incredulous.

A mathematical genius, crossing over to work on room-temperature superconductivity, or is he going to do it by hand on live stream?

Who would believe that if I told them?!

The news caused an uproar when it reached the international internet.

Chinese-American mathematics luminary Terence Tao directly shared the live stream link on social media, adding three large question marks.

Professor Wiles, who proved Fermat's Last Theorem, specifically asked his assistant to turn on the live stream, wanting to see what this young man, who had single-handedly solved five great unsolved problems of the century, would do in the field of materials science.

Even some of the world's top superconducting laboratories and research institutes have had people sneak into the live broadcast room.

After all, this is a young emperor who can open the gates of heaven with one sword and settle the world with five swords!

Who dares to underestimate us?

……

In the live broadcast room, Ji Bai stood in front of the experimental table, his fingertips rapidly tapping on the control panel, his movements as practiced as if he were playing Angela and sneaking into someone's base.

The entire process of loading the target, calibrating the substrate, starting the vacuum unit, and fine-tuning the pulse laser parameters was executed smoothly without any unnecessary pauses.

We have gained a lot of master-level materials technology from the system.

They're veteran craftsmen!

The direction of the comments section has visibly changed.

What started as a screen full of "pretentious" and "staged" photos gradually gave way to questions and exclamations of amazement:

"No? Ji Bai, you're really good at this? I thought you were just putting on an act!"

"Wait, was he just calibrating the laser path? Not using the automatic calibration program, but adjusting it manually? And only once?"

"Our lab's PLD takes half an hour to calibrate every time, but he did it in ten seconds?"

The materials science master's student fell silent. His vacuum calibration technique was even more precise than my supervisor's. When did he learn that?

"The math genius switched to Materials Science and Engineering, starting with Master-level proficiency—definitely cheat-like!"

"Others get their driver's licenses right after high school graduation, while Ji Bai opens a superconductivity lab right after high school graduation. It's infuriating to compare yourself to others!"

"The Emperor is indeed the Emperor; the materials for the math exam were a cross-disciplinary, groundbreaking achievement, weren't they!"

"Does anyone understand? My advisor just stormed into the lab and stopped our group meeting. Now the whole group is huddled around the projector watching the Great Emperor's live stream of him creating superconductors by hand!"

Ji Bai: Watch closely! Today I will open the Heavenly Gate once more to prove the Great Dao!

……

The layman looks at the excitement and the insider looks at the doorway.

While netizens were still making jokes and spamming "666," the academic bigwigs who had been waiting for the live stream all sat up straight.

Take that ultra-high vacuum pulsed laser deposition system right in the center of the lens, for example. There are very few materials science departments in domestic universities that can be equipped with it. It is definitely a "treasure" of the laboratory.

A typical master's student needs to work under the guidance of their supervisor for half a year to learn the basic operation. A slight mistake could damage the cavity and target material, which are worth millions.

In Ji Bai's hands, this precise and demanding equipment was as familiar as a frying pan in the hands of a master chef at a breakfast shop, with perfect control over the heat, speed, and deposition thickness.

Even the timing of parameter fine-tuning is ridiculously precise; a casual adjustment is based on the experience values ​​that veteran engineers have accumulated over more than a decade.

The more Academician Chen from Peking University looked at it, the more his brows furrowed.

The more I looked, the stronger my ominous premonition became!

impossible!

How could a high school student who studies mathematics be so familiar with superconducting thin film fabrication equipment?

Let alone someone who hasn't studied materials science, even among the PhD students he supervises, you couldn't find more than three with this level of proficiency.

On the other side, Professor Wang from the School of Mathematical Sciences was watching the live broadcast with a smug smile on his face.

He knew it; this kid never had a chance of winning.

He may talk nonsense, but his skills are undeniable. He's not a newbie in this field; he's clearly got a lot of real talent.

Let's see how much this kid can raise the critical value.

Even an improvement of just a few dozen points is a remarkable achievement.

At least this funding of over 100 million is perfectly reasonable!

……

In the live stream, Ji Bai kept working with his hands and also chatted with the camera to explain things.

"Let me explain. This step is called pulsed laser deposition, which is basically the same as making a pancake."

"The round plate at the bottom is the pancake pan, called the base. The target material on top is the batter. When the laser shines on it, the 'batter' vaporizes and is evenly sprayed onto the 'pan'."

Then Ji Bai tapped the parameter panel on the screen: "Just like making pancakes, you have to control the heat. If the temperature is too high, they'll burn; if it's too low, they won't be cooked. If the speed is too fast, the pancake will be too thin and easily break; if it's too slow, it will be too thick and you won't be able to bite it."

"The same applies to our superconducting thin films. Even a slight difference in thickness or uniformity can result in a huge difference in performance."

"Once this 'pancake' is spread out, we'll anneal it. It's the same principle as making pancakes more fragrant by flipping them over and steaming them. Then the finished product will be almost done."

"Um, pancakes—no, the samples are almost ready!"

"Everyone, are you ready to witness the miracle of this moment?"