Chapter 295: Steady Career

Translator: Henyee Translations  Editor: Henyee Translations

The Spring American Mathematical Society’s conference was a normal conference; it didn’t have a large influence on the mathematics community. It was not comparable to the annual European Mathematical Society’s conference.

If a student won the best speaker award at one of these conferences, it would at most bring some glory to the university. Other than that, not a lot of people would pay any attention to the conference awards.

However, most pure mathematics scholars still paid attention to the theses submitted to the Spring American Mathematical Society’s conference.

After all, mathematics was the land of geniuses. 80% of outstanding achievements were made from scholars under 40 years old…

An office in the mathematics research institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Academician Xiang Huanan leaned on his office chair. He was reading a pile of printed theses while casually drinking tea.

The old man came across a certain thesis, and he raised his eyebrows as he spoke with a smile.

“This guy really can’t take a break. He had just completed a big project, and now, he had already found something else to do.”

Although Academician Xiang Huanan didn’t say who “this guy” was, the other person sitting in his office knew what Xiang Huanan was talking about.

Academician Wang Yuping was drinking tea as well. He then casually said to his friend, “Young people are full of energy, they won’t take a break.”

Academician Xiang placed the printed thesis on the table, smiled, and said, “Collatz conjecture.”

Printed on the A4 paper was Vera’s thesis that she submitted to the American Mathematical Society: [The equivalent equation for the Collatz conjecture h(z^3) = h(z^6) + {h(z ^2) And Complex analysis of +λh(λz^2)+λ^2h(λ^2z^2)}].

Both them knew that Miss Vera Pulyuy was a student of Lu Zhou at Princeton. Lu Zhou was the second author on the thesis.

Academician Wang Yuping was slightly surprised as he said, “Collatz conjecture? That thing is not much simpler than Goldbach’s conjecture, right?”

Although Collatz conjecture wasn’t as famous as Goldbach’s conjecture, it wasn’t much lower in difficulty than Goldbach’s conjecture. In some sense, it was even more difficult than Goldbach’s conjecture.

The reason for its difficulty was because unlike Goldbach’s conjecture, it didn’t have countless predecessors paving its path of research.

The reason why Lu Zhou was able to solve Goldbach’s conjecture was due to the countless scholars that had previously built the tower of Goldbach’s conjecture. On the other hand, the Collatz conjecture had no existing tower.

At best, it had a foundation.

Lu Zhou couldn’t just “disassemble” the Goldbach’s conjecture tower and use it to build the Collatz conjecture tower. He needed to create new bricks and new materials.

Academician Xiang smiled and said, “Who knows, I’m not a number theory mathematician. If you’re curious, why don’t you just ask him?”

“I’ll have to ask him next time I see him. But this Lu Zhou kid is impressive, even his students are geniuses.” Academician Wang couldn’t help but shake his head, and he said, “It’s unfortunate that Lu Zhou didn’t come to Yan University.”

Academician Xiang smiled and said, “How is it unfortunate? He’s an internationally renowned scholar now. Compare to Yan University, it’d be great if he even returned to the country.”

If foreign Chinese researchers were willing to return to China and join the Thousand People Initiative, they could earn several times the salary of domestic researchers. Many researchers who returned were granted a million USD in research funds; this was something unimaginable in America.

Although the Thousand People Initiative had achieved great results, it still wasn’t attractive enough for world-class scholars.

“I’m just saying,” Academician Wang shook his head and said, “Mr. Lu’s teaching experience at Princeton, and his talent, combined with Yan University’s resources, can single-handedly build a world-class mathematics department at Yan University. But if it was Jin Ling University instead…”

Academician Wang didn’t finish his words, but his meaning was self-evident.

Constructing a building from scratch was undoubtedly more difficult than renovating a ready-built building.

Academician Xiang understood his old friend’s words, but he didn’t make any comments and only laughed.

In the past, he agreed with Academician Xiang; he thought that Jin Ling University was not a good choice. He even gave Lu Zhou an offer last time. But now looking back, he suddenly felt like Jin Ling University wasn’t too bad of a decision.

Neither the Chinese Academy of Sciences nor Yan University could give Lu Zhou the amount of space for development as well as the freedom he needed, but Jin Ling University could.

Jin Ling University was also ranked Top 40 in the country, and like Yan University, it also had great resources.

Although Yan University had more resources than Jin Ling University, Lu Zhou chose Jin Ling University due to its creative freedom.

Maybe Lu Zhou could build an entire mathematics department himself.

No one knew for sure.

…

After the spring American Mathematical Society’s conference ended, Lu Zhou finally got on a flight back home.

This time he didn’t tell anyone he was coming back. He secretly bought a plane ticket, got on the plane, hopped onto the train, and got back to his home in Jiangcheng.

A bright and loud voice welcomed him back, “Oh, bro, you’re back?! Let me take your luggage!”

Xiao Tong ditched her gaming teammates, climbed down the sofa, and ran toward the door.

Lu Zhou looked at her excited expression and smiled.

“Your gift’s in the luggage, go get it yourself.”

Lu Xiaotong received a gift from her brother every year; this was a Lu family’s tradition.

Although it wasn’t a particularly expensive gift, it was still a joyful experience for Xiao Tong.

Lu Zhou gave his luggage to his sister, changed into slippers, and sat on the living room sofa.

After a while, Xiao Tong found the gift and happily walked into her room.

Lu Zhou gift for her was a Swiss cosmetics brand makeup set. He didn’t know makeup well, but thankfully his student, Hardy, was surprisingly knowledgeable on this subject.

Xiao Tong came back to the living room and sat on the sofa next to Lu Zhou. She then picked up her phone and prepared to start a new match.

Lu Zhou looked at the screen and saw that her ranking in the game hasn’t increased, so he asked casually, “How were your exams?”

Xiao Tong replied proudly, “Ah, I’m obviously a genius student as university courses are way too easy.”

Lu Zhou was amused by this.

When he was in his first year, he also naively thought that the course content was all high school material.

Especially English.

The college entrance requirement was only at fourth level English, it was nothing more than rote learning.

However, the second semester came and the difficulty increased exponentially.

Then, the real struggle began when core and elective classes came.

However, Lu Zhou didn’t feel the struggle at all. His three roommates were the ones that did. When he started his core subjects, most of the material was too easy for him.

“… And I’m a university student now, stop asking about my grades all day. Don’t get the impression that I play on my phone all day. I’m on a holiday, do you get it? I study a lot during the semester,” Xiao Tong replied before she quickly started the next game and left the spawn fountain.

Lu Zhou certainly believed his sister.

There was no way that Xiao Tong could be stuck in Bronze for an entire year when even his “mental retardation” AI, Xiao Ai, could climb out of Bronze. She had to have been studying instead of playing Kings of Glory.

Xiao Tong suddenly smiled sneakily as she teased her brother, “Oh yeah, bro, don’t talk about me all the time, how are you?”

Lu Zhou didn’t notice her sneaky smile when he replied, “Me? I’m okay, my career and academics are going steady…”

Xiao Tong immediately asked, “What about your love life?”

Lu Zhou: “…”

F*ck sake!

You’re doing this intentionally, aren’t you?

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