(IC)

Zhao Bowen, a middle school dropout in Beijing, has drawn public attention as he is now leading a research team consisting of more than 20 experts at the BGI, China's largest genome and bioinformatics analysis center in Shenzhen, south China's Guangdong Province.

Zhao, 19, was a student at the High School Affiliated with Renmin University of China. Zhao started an internship and did biotic experiments at the research institutes of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS) while in junior middle school. He later got a research position at BGI because of the recommendation of his tutor at CAAS. During the summer vacation of the second year of senior middle school, Zhao began his internship at BGI and was asked to work there as a result of his excellent performance. Zhao chose to quit school and be a full-time researcher at BGI.

Dubbed "China's Bill Gates" by BGI's president Wang Jian, Zhao is now the leader of the research of the genome analysis of human beings' cognitive ability. From 2010, he has led domestic and foreign experts on mathematics, physics and psychology to study how the human genome influences intellectual differences in humans.