SIXTEEN projects hosted by or in cooperation with 19 Shenzhen enterprises, research institutes and universities won prizes at the 2016 State Preeminent Science and Technology Award ceremony, China’s top science award, which was held in Beijing yesterday.

The projects covered three categories, including one project in natural science, three technological inventions and 13 concerning scientific advancement.

The Top Natural Science Prize went to a new type of neutrino oscillation found in the Daya Bay reactor neutrino experiment conducted in Shenzhen.

The key technology and application project of TD-LTE, the fourth-generation telecommunications technology, jointly developed by Huawei, ZTE and Yulong, won the special award for scientific advancement.

A research project by the Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School won the second prize in the natural science category, while the key technology and application of the DTMB system, which Shenzhen Skyworth cooperated in, won the first prize in the scientific advancement category.

The winning projects covered sectors such as information technology, new energy, new material and biomedicine, and 15 were carried out through cooperation with enterprises, showing the dominant role enterprises play in innovation.

A research project on high- precision numerical calculation by Tang Tao, chair professor of mathematics and vice president of SUSTech, won the second prize in the category of natural science.

Tang, a well-known scientist in computational mathematics, completed the project when he worked at Hong Kong Baptist University. Tang started working as chair professor at SUSTech in 2015 and was named research fellow of the American Mathematics Society in 2017.

“Shenzhen highly values education and research, and I have seen great progress in talent introduction in the past year working at SUSTech,” said Tang in an interview yesterday. Tang believes Shenzhen, an innovation-based city, will win national science prizes with its development of talent training and introduction.

Nobel laureate Tu Youyou and physicist Zhao Zhongxian were honored with the highest science award, which includes 5 million yuan (US$721,000) in prize money, for their outstanding contributions to scientific and technological innovation.

Zhao, a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has dedicated over four decades to researching superconductivity. Superconductivity refers to a phenomenon where electrons travel with no resistance when a conducting material, known as a superconductor, is cooled below a certain temperature.

Tu, a pharmacist, is best known for her 2015 Nobel Prize in Medicine for her work using artemisinin to treat malaria. Tu is the first woman to have been given China’s highest science award.

According to a statement on the official website of the State Council, five foreign experts were among the awardees.

Started in 2000, the State Preeminent Science and Technology Award of China is the country’s highest scientific award. Given each January, it is also referred to as the State Supreme Science and Technology Award, and as China’s Nobel Prize.