Xie Jialin (LIU JIE)	Wu Liangyong (JU PENG)

Two Chinese scientists, physicist Xie Jialin and architect Wu Liangyong, received the State Top Scientific and Technological Award, China's top science award, on February 14, 2012, for their outstanding contributions to scientific and technological innovation. The two scientists, both members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), each received 5 million yuan ($794,900) for the prize. China has given this award annually to elite scientists and researchers since 2000.

Xie, 92, is one of the founders and pioneers of China's accelerator physics. He once studied at the California Institute of Technology in the United States, and then obtained a PhD from Stanford University. He returned to China in 1955. In 1964, Xie and his colleagues accomplished the building of a 30 MeV electron linac, which was the first one ever built in China. He led the construction of China's first infrared free electron laser in the early 1990s, which was also the first of its kind in Asia. Xie was selected a member of the CAS in 1980.

Wu, 90, is one of the founders of the Department of Architecture of Tsinghua University. He gained a master's degree in architecture and urban design from Cranbrook Academy of Art in the United States in 1949. He returned to China in 1950. Since 1987, he has been engaged in the Beijing Ju'er Hutong New Courtyard House research project and has won several awards at the national level, a gold medal by Asian Architects of Regional Council Award for Architecture and UN World Habitat Award. Wu is widely known as an expert in teaching, researching and practicing in the fields of architecture, urban planning and design.