October 30, the cloud unveiling ceremony of the WLA Community was held at the opening ceremony of the 3rd World Laureates Association Forum, bringing together the first batch of WLA Joint Laboratory for International Cooperation under one roof.
Located in the Lingang new area of the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, the WLA Community is an important part of the international collaborative innovation function of the area. With a planning area of 2.5 square kilometres, the Community extends to Nangang Avenue in the east, Haigang Avenue in the west, First Haiji Road in the south and Third South Huanhu Road in the north, linking up the Lingang Science and Technology City and Headquarters Bay.
The WLA Community will form a strategic simultaneous resonance with the new area. It will fully rely on Shanghai's advantages, face the great expectations of the "International Collaborative Innovation Area", gather the headquarters of the world's top international organizations and the innovation laboratory bases of leading scientists, and form a core area of special economic functional zone with strong global resource allocation capacity; it will cater to the major national demands, focus on biomedicine, AI, integrated circuits, new energy, new materials, quantum science and other world’s cutting-edge fields of science and technology, transform the advantage of "the first mile" into the development kinetic energy of "the last mile", integrate the top scientific resources with the supporting construction of hospitals and schools, and create a space carrier best conforming to the law of innovation.
The first batch of laboratories to be settled in the Community include the Kornberg Laboratory of Molecular Biology with the anti-infection and microbial resistance research as the main direction, the Lerner Immunochemistry Laboratory focusing on the development of immunity and immune related drugs, and the Dewick Glycobiology Laboratory pursuing the glycobiology three Joint Laboratories for International Cooperation in the field of life science.
Relying on the platform of World Laureates Association Forum, the WLA Community solidifies scientists and related resources, and promotes the transformation of the think tank and research achievements of Chinese and international scientists into a powerful driving force for economic and social development through innovative institutional design. The Community, with the strategic mission of "leading the science and technology strategic force for the next 20 years and reserving the scientific resources for the next 50 years", and positioning of "the global hotbed of major frontier science in the new era with distinctive features", will leverage the WLA cluster effect, take the resources of top scientists as the core and the basic science as the foothold, create the Joint Laboratory for International Cooperation, the hotbed for international leading science and technology, the scientific innovation harbour connecting the world, the headquarters bases of science organization gathering the great minds worldwide, and the offshore innovation zone with flexible mechanisms.
The WLA Community is an important achievement of the World Laureates Association Forum and an important measure to solidify the ideological achievements of the forum. Its launching was announced in the 1st World Laureates Association Forum in 2018; its program was shown to the world in the 2nd forum in 2019; and it was cloud unveiled globally in the 3rd forum in 2020.