The 2024 World Laureates Association (WLA) Forum will convene in Shanghai from Oct 25 to 27 at the forum's permanent site in the city's Lin-gang Special Area.

This year's forum, themed "Excellence in Science", will bring together nearly 300 participants, including 11 Nobel laureates, over 50 renowned scientists from nearly 20 countries and regions, and around 100 promising young scientists.

The opening ceremony will feature keynote speeches by prominent scientists, including Nobel laureates David Gross, Carol Greider, and Christopher Pissarides, alongside UNESCO-Equatorial Guinea International Prize laureate Qiao Jie and winner of China's top science award, the National Science and Technology Award, Xue Qikun.

The forum will host over 10 thematic conferences and off-site exchanges, welcoming government officials, university representatives, and members of research institutions, innovative companies, and venture capital firms. This year's forum will inaugurate the Physical Science Conference, complementing the existing Intelligence Science Conference and Life Science Conference as the forum's three primary conferences.

Committed to cultivating future scientific leaders, the forum will host more than 80 young scientists, with over 50 attending for the first time. The forum will also feature the Sci-T Conference, where 100 young science enthusiasts, or "Sci-ters", selected through a nationwide selection process, will participate. In a novel initiative, the Science Education Forum will focus on empowering middle school girls interested in science.

This year, the WLA Forum will be open to the public and allocate attendance quotas to universities and research institutions. Additionally, the WLA Forum Frontier Lectures and the WLA Prize Winner Academic Exchange activities will be held at universities, research institutions, and middle schools in Shanghai.

Following the forum in Shanghai, participating scientists will be invited to attend the 2024 World Laureates Greater Bay Area Forum on Oct 29 in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.

Luo Bin contributed to this story.