Chapter 870
A National Treasure: Thorium-based Molten Salt Reactor Nuclear Energy
the next day.
News of this financing immediately topped the trending lists on major social media platforms.
The first phase of financing amounted to 300 billion!
Galaxy Technology, valued at trillions!
A stock worth hundreds of billions of dollars that immediately fell below its IPO price – a desperate gamble!
A wealth-creation myth!
On-site subscriptions reached 160 billion yuan!
Each one of them brought great shock to netizens.
Each topic, once clicked on, sparks heated debates among numerous netizens.
This is absolutely explosive!
This is only a few scattered pieces of information that have been leaked.
As the news fermented, more information gradually emerged.
For netizens, the detailed planning of Galaxy Education and Galaxy Supermarket described by Wang Donglai excited them all.
The popularity of this topic has also led to many videos of working people going viral.
A Douyin user with the online name 'Xiao Chen is drifting' uploaded his first short video. Taking advantage of the popularity of this topic and his simple style, he directly broke through the traffic pool.
In the video, the blogger tells the camera: "I've been working as a stock clerk in a large supermarket in the provincial capital for three years. My monthly salary is 3200 yuan, and after social security deductions, I only get 2800 yuan. Rent is 1200 yuan, food is 1500 yuan, and the rest... well, I can't afford to get sick, I can't afford to socialize. Galaxy's starting salary of 7000 yuan? That means I can rent a room with a window, afford fruit, and maybe... I can even send some money home every month. Mr. Wang, please open a store in our city, I'll be the first to sign up!"
The content is simple, but combined with the music and the atmosphere it creates, it instantly becomes highly infectious.
The comment section below the video also became extremely popular, with the number of likes skyrocketing and the number of comments growing rapidly.
"Located in Shenyang, also looking!"
"We can forget about the small, third-tier county town, but could we set up a logistics center here?"
"This isn't just a supermarket recruitment drive, it's targeted poverty alleviation!"
"I suggest you investigate Wang Donglai. Something's not right with him—he actually wants us poor people to live like human beings."
"I don't believe Jack Ma when he says he's not interested in money, and I don't really believe Brother Qiang when he says he's not interested in money either, but I definitely believe what Boss Wang says!"
"..."
On the Douyin platform, there are countless discussions and videos on this topic.
This is also true on other platforms.
On Zhihu, a question titled "How to evaluate the detailed plans for Galaxy Supermarket and Galaxy Education announced by Wang Donglai of Galaxy Technology?" has already garnered over a thousand answers and has received over ten million views in a short period of time.
One of the highly-rated answers said this.
"What Wang Donglai did was to use the violence of capital to break through the 'low-end labor market equilibrium trap'."
"The reason why wages are low in the traditional retail industry is that, under the existing model, raising wages would directly erode profits, causing companies to lose competitiveness and creating a vicious cycle of 'low wages - low service quality - low profits - even lower wages'."
“Wang Donglai used 300 billion yuan in capital and the promise of ‘no profit for three years’ to forcefully break open this cycle.”
"It's clear that he's betting that once there's a generational gap in service quality and user experience, the resulting brand barriers and traffic value will ultimately cover the extremely high labor costs."
"This is crazy, but if he wins the bet, the benchmark for the domestic service industry will be permanently raised."
This answer only addresses the planning of Galaxy Supermarket from an economic perspective.
Zhihu, this text-based platform, can be considered to have gathered the last group of highly educated people on the internet who still adhere to writing and answering questions with data.
Every highly-rated answer is well-reasoned and has its merits.
Therefore, the replies and comments under this highly-rated answer were also quite sharp.
"As an economics student, I was surprised to see 'creative destruction' in real life outside of textbooks."
"Whether we win or not, I don't know, but as a consumer, I wholeheartedly support someone who uses money to provide better service."
"Beware of capital manipulating public opinion! The higher they praise now, the faster they'll fall later!"
"If Galaxy Supermarket were to follow Pang Donglai's model, it would be a blessing for consumers. I can't even imagine how great it would be."
"..."
Galaxy Education's influence in this area is also considerable.
After all, given Wang Donglai's reputation and status, it is highly credible that he would say he would invest 100,000 yuan per person per year in vocational education.
Outstanding graduates can directly enter Galaxy Technology for employment, which makes them even more trustworthy.
Anyone with a brain can figure this out: this is about cultivating future talent.
It's fair to say that the impact of this financing announcement has been enormous.
The news brought a completely different feeling to ordinary netizens and industry professionals.
But no matter how you look at it, everyone has a clear understanding.
That is, these industries will inevitably undergo tremendous changes due to Galaxy Technology's entry, and these changes will be both good and bad.
While netizens across the internet were fiercely discussing these news items, Wang Donglai, the central figure in this incident, quietly left Shanghai and, instead of returning to the headquarters of Galaxy Technology, went to Gansu Province.
In November 2017, Gansu Province signed a strategic cooperation framework agreement with the Chinese Academy of Sciences on the fourth-generation advanced nuclear energy thorium-based molten salt reactor.
Wang Donglai came to Gansu Province for this very reason.
All the technical ideas he had discussed with Wu Qingsong last time were reported to their superiors by Wu Qingsong in detail.
Clearly, the higher-ups have great trust in Wang Donglai's research capabilities, which is why this trip was arranged.
A private jet landed directly at an airport. No media outlets knew Wang Donglai's whereabouts, and even only a handful of core management personnel at Galaxy Technology knew that Wang Donglai was going to discuss a key project.
This has happened several times before, so the core executives of Galaxy Technology are used to it.
Three hours later, the convoy entered the heavily guarded R&D center of the "National Thorium-based Molten Salt Reactor Nuclear Energy System (TMSR) Pilot Science and Technology Project".
Far from the hustle and bustle, the huge experimental factories and office buildings are located on the edge of the Gobi Desert, exuding a solemn sense of isolation from the world.
The atmosphere in the meeting room was heavy.
A dozen or so experts and scholars with gray or half-gray hair sat on either side of the long table. They were top figures in China’s nuclear energy, materials, physics and chemistry fields.
Wang Donglai sat at one end, accompanied only by an assistant skilled in technical record-keeping.
The project leader, Academician Chen Mingyuan, spoke first, his tone polite but scrutinizing as he addressed Wang Dong: "Chairman Wang, on behalf of the R&D center, I welcome you."
Chen Mingyuan naturally knew Wang Donglai's name.
After all, Wang Donglai is the youngest academician in China, and he has proven many world mathematical problems, earning him a great reputation worldwide, even in different professional fields.
Chen Mingyuan, however, had a different opinion about Wang Donglai's arrival.
Thorium-based molten salt reactor nuclear energy is his research area, and he has devoted a lot of time and effort to it.
He could even confidently claim that he was the top expert in this field in China, and that no one in the country was better than him. Therefore, when he received the notification that Wang Donglai had some views and understanding on thorium-based molten salt reactor nuclear energy and that Wang Donglai would be arranged to come for technical exchanges and discussions, and that he was required to organize technical experts to receive him, he was somewhat displeased.
With this in mind, Chen Mingyuan also prepared a "show of force" for Wang Donglai.
Whether someone has real skills or not, a real-world demonstration will reveal all!
"We've reviewed the technical design outline you submitted above, and to be honest, it's very bold!"
"Especially the part about 'online refueling and combustion depth optimization of molten salt reactors based on adaptive flow field algorithms' is theoretically very attractive, but in engineering..."
Chen Mingyuan paused here, then skipped over the point and moved on to another point, saying, "Our current 'Xihe-2' experimental reactor has been stuck on the first key problem for almost two years."
Hearing this, Wang Donglai understood everything; he knew this was a test.
"Please speak, Academician Chen."
Wang Donglai leaned forward, his eyes focused, his expression full of confidence.
At this moment, Professor Li, who was in charge of the core physics design, pushed up his glasses and said in a somewhat stiff tone, "We are stuck on the coupling oscillation between molten salt flow and neutron field."
"Simply put, molten salt is both fuel and coolant. Its flow state in the pipes and core strongly affects the neutron distribution, while the temperature gradient generated by power changes in turn affects the flow characteristics of molten salt."
"This is a strong nonlinear coupling problem. Our existing simulation algorithms are either oversimplified and lose accuracy, or the computation is too large to be used for real-time monitoring and control. The reason why 'Xihe-2' has been hesitant to increase its power for long-term operation is because this 'heart tremor' problem cannot be predicted or suppressed in theory."
Another materials expert added, "We tried seventeen turbulence model corrections, and the highest match with the experimental data was only 82%, and it was unstable."
"The 'adaptive optimization' envisioned by Chairman Wang is based on the premise of accurately describing the current state."
“But we can’t see clearly right now, so we can’t talk about ‘control’.”
The meeting room fell silent, and all eyes were on Wang Donglai.
The doubts are obvious: what right does a businessman, even if he is a world-class mathematician, have to interfere with the most cutting-edge nuclear energy systems?
To them, Wang Donglai was a complete novice!
If Wang Donglai, an outsider, can guide the research and development of cutting-edge nuclear energy systems, then wouldn't they be useless?
Wang Donglai was silent for a moment, then suddenly asked, "Professor Li, is the core governing equation set you used based on the modified Navier-Stokes equation coupled with the multi-group neutron diffusion equation, and does it take into account the feedback between the fission heat source and the flow in the energy equation?"
Professor Li was taken aback for a moment before realizing that Wang Donglai had already proven the Navier-Stokes equation. A sense of anticipation rose in his heart, and he nodded, saying, "Yes!"
"Could you show me the initial parameters, boundary conditions, and key dimensionless numbers from your latest failed simulation?"
"Especially the Reynolds number and Prandtl number of molten salt, and the first three moments of the neutron flux distribution?"
Wang Donglai spoke at a steady pace, yet his vocabulary was extremely professional.
A slight commotion arose in the conference room.
Academician Chen's eyes flickered slightly, signaling his assistant to hand Wang Donglai a thick, encrypted tablet computer.
Wang Donglai took the encrypted tablet, quickly glanced at the data, and then put it down. His fingers tapped lightly on the table unconsciously, as if constructing some kind of image in his mind.
A few minutes later, he opened his eyes, a look of realization flashing across his face.
"The problem may not lie in the turbulence model itself, but in the lack of scale correlation."
He picked up a marker, walked to the whiteboard on the side of the conference room, and said, “You see, the traditional coupling approach is to solve the fluid domain and the neutron domain separately and exchange data at the interface.”
"However, in molten salt reactors, there are strong cross-scale correlations between the microscale motion of fuel particles, the mesoscale transport of bubbles, the macroscopic flow of the reactor core, and the slowing down, absorption, and fission of neutrons in different energy groups."
"You are trying to use a unified turbulence model to characterize all vortices from millimeter to meter scales, and treating the neutron field as a source term that is uniform or simply partitioned. This will inevitably lose key information."
As he spoke, Wang Donglai wrote on the whiteboard.
This time, Wang Donglai no longer wrote in the plain language of a business plan, but instead filled the page with partial differential equation symbols, integral operators, and tensor expressions.
"I suspect that you have overlooked the effect of the non-uniform microscopic distribution of thorium-based fuel particles in molten salt on the local hardening of the neutron energy spectrum, and the feedback loop in which this local energy spectrum change, in turn, affects local heating by changing the fission rate, thereby generating tiny vortices."
He wrote and talked at the same time, his pen moving swiftly, yet it did not appear sloppy, but rather extremely neat.
"This loop operates on a timescale of milliseconds and a spatial scale of millimeters, but it amplifies disturbances and propagates them to the macroscopic flow field and neutron field, much like a cancer cell."
He wrote down a new set of coupling equations, which were extremely complex in structure, yet exuded a simple beauty.
“We can introduce a cross-scale correlation function based on the adjoint operator and stochastic process theory. Instead of directly solving for all scales, it establishes a probabilistic mapping of perturbation propagation from micro to meso to macro scales.”
"By monitoring temperature, pressure, and neutron flux fluctuations at several key macroscopic points in real time, we can infer possible instability modes at the microscopic and mesoscale levels and perform feedforward compensation."
He circled a key term in the equation and introduced it to everyone in the conference room: "Look here, this nonlinear decay kernel. If my derivation is correct, its specific form should be related to the pressure pulsation decay curve at a specific frequency observed in the third loop during your experiments."
Do you have the original data for that curve?
The meeting room was completely silent.
Professor Li suddenly stood up, rushed to his computer, and with trembling fingers pulled up a set of encrypted data to begin comparing and calculating.
A minute later, he looked up, his face filled with disbelief and shock, and said in a stunned tone, "The initial estimate of the match is over 95%! It's this attenuation mode! We had always thought it was measurement noise!"
Academician Chen also stood up, walked to the whiteboard, carefully examined the formulas, and slowly moved his fingers along the derivation steps.
After a long while, he let out a long breath and looked at Wang Donglai, his scrutiny replaced by amazement.
"Academician Wang...how did you...do all this...?"
Unbeknownst to him, Chen Mingyuan had changed how he addressed Wang Donglai, and his tone now carried a hint of respect.
"Mathematics, and a habit of thinking across disciplines."
Wang Donglai put down his pen, his tone calm, as if he had only solved a simple problem.
"Retail involves dealing with complex systems that handle the behavior of tens of millions of users, while education requires designing multi-factor models for talent development."
"Essentially, it has something in common with characterizing the complex behavior of a few kilograms of molten salt inside a reactor—it's all about understanding and managing complex systems."
"These kinds of questions are actually quite simple; they're not that difficult!"
Wang Donglai spoke calmly, but those two sentences were like a slap in the face to them.
The problem that had troubled them for so long was solved by Wang Donglai in just a few minutes.
Compared to their previous disdain, they only seem like clowns now.
As a result, everyone's mindset immediately changed, and they became excited instead of the previous doubts and indifference.
Because they saw a glimmer of hope for technological breakthroughs in Wang Donglai.
Academician Chen nodded slowly and extended his hand: "Academician Wang, it seems we need to re-evaluate your 'technical concept'."
"Do you have time to hold a three-day closed-door technical seminar with us old guys and the core members of the center?"
“Of course, no problem!” Wang Donglai shook hands with the academician.
The wind howled outside the window in the Gobi Desert, while inside the conference room, a brand-new dialogue about the future of energy had just officially begun.
The hustle and bustle of the internet and the quiet focus here seem like two parallel worlds.
But Wang Donglai knew that they would eventually converge—when one day in the future, massive amounts of cheap and safe nuclear energy would be generated here and injected into the galactic ecosystem he envisioned, which would require enormous energy support.
He glanced back at the densely packed formulas on the whiteboard; it wasn't just mathematics, it was a key.
He has proven to these scholars who safeguard the nation's core technologies that he might indeed know where the keyhole is. (End of Chapter)