In which language should scientific findings be published?

As the Chinese probe Chang-6 returned to Earth with the first samples taken from the far side of the Moon, the scientific community could soon realize a dream: to unravel the secrets of this lunar object.

But once the approximately two kilo samples collected on June 2 in the northeastern part of the South Pole-Aitken Basin are analyzed, in what language and in what journals will the results of these historic findings be published?

There is a perception in the Chinese scientific community that English is not only an effective means of communication, but also a drive towards global recognition. The use of Chinese is marginal, and the language is sacrificed on the altar of international influence.

Chinese scientists [comme la plupart des chercheurs dans le monde] It is customary to write their works in English and share them with their peers in prestigious journals, especially with Americans. Science and British Nature.

So, in 2020, when the Chang’e-5 mission collected samples from the visible side of the Moon, the first research in decades was conducted by a team of Chinese and Western researchers and Published in October 2021 Science [en anglais].

Three more in the same month Scientific articles continuously In NatureIt caused a stir, says a teacher Science China Press, Publishing House of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

Quality goes down

Rocks taken in 2020 led to several surprising discoveries: they are more recent than samples brought back by the Apollo (USA) and Luna (USSR) missions in the 1960s and 1970s.

“Our country’s revolutionary advances in technical and scientific matters should be announced in major Chinese journals, and we want to extend our influence” The aforementioned author, who asked to remain anonymous, observes.

Because it wasn’t always like this. Tu Youyou, who won China’s first Nobel Prize in Science in 2015, published his paper on the discovery of artemisinin in 1977. [utilisée dans le traitement contre le paludisme] In Chinese Science Bulletin.

Co-sponsored by ACS and China Natural Science Foundation, this journal has been published for a long time [en chinois] Great Chinese discoveries, but has suffered since the 1990s from a decline in the quality of manuscripts.

Speaking at a conference in 2018, George Fu Gao, a leading expert in virology and immunology and former director of the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), recalled what the Chinese had experienced. “The Hour of His Glory” as