Tsinghua University, Peking University, and Zhejiang University lead the candidates for new academicians of the two academies. The youngest nominee is 39 years old.

The biennial election of academicians is here.

On August 20th, the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering respectively released announcements on their official websites, unveiling the list of valid candidates for the 2025 academician election.

Among them, there are 639 valid candidates for academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and 660 for academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

It is reported that subsequent external peer expert evaluations and elections at the academician election conference will be carried out to select new academicians (no more than 100 for each academy).

According to the timeline in 2023: the list of valid candidates for the election was released on August 31st, and the results of the academician election were announced on November 22nd.

Even though there is still some time before the final results are announced, this list of candidates is still very worthy of attention.

Observing Artificial Intelligence through the Academician Election

The biennial academician election is not only a significant event in the scientific research community but also reflects the development trends of various disciplines.

Overall, the number of candidates from both academies has increased this year: there are 639 candidates from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, representing an approximate increase of 9.6% compared to 2023.

There are 660 candidates from the Chinese Academy of Engineering, an approximate increase of 0.8% compared to 2023.

At the institutional level, Tsinghua University and Peking University stand out prominently. The total number of candidates for academicians from the two academies is 58 and 55 respectively. Zhejiang University ranks third, with a total of 39 candidates. Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Fudan University, Nanjing University, and the University of Science and Technology of China follow closely, with a total of 31, 25, 25, and 22 candidates respectively.

The institutions ranked among the top thirty in terms of the number of candidates are shown in the following table:

It is worth mentioning that the youngest candidate on this list for the academician election is only 39 years old, Professor Wang Shuao from Soochow University.

While the number of academician candidates is steadily increasing, the adjustment of the disciplinary distribution for academician selection and the attention to emerging fields are also particularly noticeable.

As the highest academic title established by the state in the fields of science and engineering technology, the disciplinary allocation for academician election also reflects to some extent the state's preference for specific disciplines and fields.

Taking artificial intelligence as an example, at the disciplinary level, it has gradually risen from a "sub - field" of information technology to an "independent discipline".

According to the "Guidelines for the 2025 Election of Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences", the mathematical and physical foundation of artificial intelligence science and technology belongs to the Department of Information Technology Science, standing side by side with the two major categories of Information I and Information II, and is allocated one quota separately. In 2023, artificial intelligence was merely a branch of the Information I category.

Although there is still only one quota for artificial intelligence this year, from the perspective of disciplinary division, the focus has changed, and artificial intelligence shows a trend of becoming an independent major category.

Furthermore, by comparing the "Guidelines for the 2025 Election of Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering" with the "Guidelines for the 2023 Election of Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering".

We found that robotics technology has replaced cyberspace security and, standing side by side with artificial intelligence and automation system technology, has become a priority - supported discipline.

(Note: The above figure is from the Guidelines for the 2025 Election of Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering)

(Note: The above figure is from the Guidelines for the 2023 Election of Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering)

Based on the above arrangements and adjustments, we can say that artificial intelligence (including robotics) has become a key area favored in the academician election.

As stated in the "Guidelines for the 2025 Election of Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering":

Emphasis should be placed on selecting academicians from researchers who have long been at the forefront of scientific research and engineering technology, tilting towards key areas urgently needed by the country, emerging disciplines, interdisciplinary disciplines, major national projects, major scientific research tasks, and the construction of major scientific and technological infrastructure.

Moreover, from the distribution of candidates, we can also glimpse the trend of fine - tuning within disciplines.

For example, in the list of candidates for the supplementary election of academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering (Department of Information and Electronic Engineering), prestigious universities strong in artificial intelligence such as Shanghai Jiao Tong University (4), Tsinghua University (3), University of Science and Technology of China (3), Peking University (3), Beihang University (3), Huazhong University of Science and Technology (3) have frequently appeared.

On the level of specific candidates, it is also not difficult to find that there are significantly more figures from the field of artificial intelligence:

For example, Chen Yunji from the Institute of Computing Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences (his younger brother, Chen Tianshi, is the CEO of Cambricon), Gao Xinbo from Chongqing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Li Xuelong from China Telecom Group Co., Ltd., Zhou Zhihua from Nanjing University, Hu Guoping from iFlytek, Tang Jie from Tsinghua University, Liu Yunhao from Tsinghua University, Ma Lizhuang from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Bao Hujun from Zhejiang University, Lin Zhouchen from Peking University, Zhu Songchun from Peking University, Huang Tiejun from Peking University, and Chen Xilin, the director of the Institute of Computing Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences are all on the list.

(Is there your tutor?)

Undoubtedly, artificial intelligence, as a key field in the future, is in its prime.

One More Thing

Finally, let's take a look at several heavy - weight recommenders in this election:

Yan Ning, the dean of the Shenzhen Academy of Medical Sciences and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, recommended Professor Chai Jijie from Westlake University. It is worth mentioning that both of them are students of Shi Yigong, the president of Westlake University and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Wang Jian, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and the director of Zhejiang Lab, recommended Professor Shi Yuanchun from the Department of Computer Science and Technology of Tsinghua University.

Zheng Nanning, a well - known scholar in computer vision and the former president of Xi'an Jiaotong University, recommended Professor Zhu Songchun, the current dean of the Beijing General Artificial Intelligence Research Institute.

Lü Jian, the former president of Nanjing University and a well - known scholar in computer software, recommended Professor Zhou Zhihua, the author of the well - known "Machine Learning" book.

Reference links:

[1]https://www.cae.cn/cae/html/main/col245/2025-08/20/20250820205538931177768_1.html

[2]https://yszx.casad.cas.cn/tzgg/202508/t20250818_5079832.html

This article is from the WeChat official account "QbitAI", author: henry, published by 36Kr with permission.