Yang Dan and Mu-ming Poo, University of California, Berkeley

There's good reason for Xu to be in Shanghai—both virtually and in person. In addition to his duties as an HHMI investigator in Yale's department of genetics, he is a cofounder of the Institute of Developmental Biology and Molecular Medicine at Fudan, one of China's leading biomedical research universities. Xu's work at those two laboratories, half a world apart, aims to give scientists valuable research tools to help reveal the genetic underpinnings of many human diseases.

The around-the-world arrangement— under which Xu spends about one of every four weeks teaching and researching in China—is also an innovative step toward closer collaboration with scientists in a nation that lagged behind North American research for most of the 20th century and lost many of its talented young researchers to the West.

Today, China is catching up, in part by attracting expatriates like Xu who are willing to work at least part time to help improve the quality of Chinese research. Their personal stories vary, but many share the feeling that it is time to “give back” to their native land, which—after decades of stagnation—is poised to become a major international player in biomedical research. As China expands its laboratories and begins to adopt successful templates of Western science, many experts see the potential for more synergy among biomedical researchers in the two countries.

“I see science as very much a global enterprise,” says HHMI President Robert Tjian, a biochemist who left Hong Kong as a young child with his parents and, after a brief time in South America, has since lived in the United States. “If the American style of science can be disseminated to other places, it can only be good—especially in the field of medicine.”

		China's Potential HHMI scientists lend additional perspective. HHMI investigator Xiaodong Wang, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas Read More

The Fudan institute combines a Western model of research with a Chinese cost structure (see “Bold Move,” page 6)—a template that Xu says is needed to help spur innovation in China's research.

“China has a tremendous number of smart young people who are interested in pursuing science, and its recent economic growth has made it possible to invest heavily in science and technology research,” he says. “What China needs now are role models in innovative science.”

Researchers and students who work with him, both in China and in New Haven, describe Xu as such a model. “He is creative, highly focused, and a great mentor,” says Yale postdoc Sheng Ding, who first studied under Xu in Shanghai.

The story of how Xu became a role model is emblematic of the changing perspectives of expatriate Chinese scientists over the last 30 years. The former “black sheep” of his Jiaxing high school has become an American mentor for a new generation of bright young science students in a Chinese city that has become a window to the West.

Photo: Dustin Aksland

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