HEAD OF THE DAY
🇨🇳 Tu Youyou
💊 From Ancient Texts to Nobel Prize: Tu Youyou, a Chinese pharmacologist, discovered artemisinin—the compound that revolutionized malaria treatment and saved millions of lives. In the 1970s, she worked on Project 523, a state research program to combat malaria. Seeking new approaches, Tu turned to traditional Chinese medical texts, found clues pointing to sweet wormwood (Artemisia annua), and developed a novel extraction method that preserved the active compound.
In 2015, she received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for this work—the first female scientist from mainland China to win in that category.
👉 Lesson Learned: Tu’s success shows the power of combining tradition with modern science. Innovation doesn’t only happen in high-tech labs—sometimes the decisive answers are hidden in centuries-old sources waiting to be read anew.
The China Survival Guide for Western Businesses
Entity setup, WeChat strategy, hiring your first local team. 12+ years on the ground in Shanghai.
