As the first batch of students to study abroad and the first to return to China, Su Zhicai received great attention from the empire after returning to China, can this not be taken seriously, in order to send these students to study abroad, the empire spent an average of more than 5,000 yuan for these students.

From the perspective of capital, the huge investment is spent, and it is natural to recover the cost.

Unless it is an international student who is really not a student, as long as he succeeds in his studies, then the empire will definitely reuse these returning students and squeeze out all their use value.

As the first returned student in China to succeed in his studies, Su Zhicai was also personally received by Lin Zhe for the first time, and when he learned that Lin Zhe was going to meet him in person, Su Zhicai was so excited that he couldn't even sleep on the first night of going to Xinhua Palace.

When Lin Zhe met with Su Zhicai, he said that the imperial family would fund him to continue his research in the field of physics, and invited him to be a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences, presiding over physics-related research under the Royal Academy of Sciences, and the royal family would provide a total of more than 100,000 yuan in research funds to him and his team in the next five years.

The Royal Academy of Sciences, which was established by Lin Zhe only in the middle of this year, is not a purely official institution, because it has nothing to do with the imperial government, but it is not a purely private institution, because the funding of this institution mainly comes from the support of the royal family.

Of course, these investments are not gratuitous, in fact, these investments are invested by major companies under the royal family, and these companies will obtain the patent rights to these scientific research results.

In order to encourage the private sector to conduct in-depth research on science and protect the intellectual property rights of technical personnel, it is also to encourage and protect enterprises to upgrade and develop technology. The Empire had long since the relevant laws had not yet been promulgated, and the 'Patent Law' was introduced by way of administrative regulations

Guarantee the scientific research achievements of enterprises and other institutions and individuals. As long as you apply for a patent, you can obtain legal security, one of the more obvious examples is the 1858 Linde rifle. This rifle was developed by the Linde Machinery Factory, but now the Jinling Arsenal, Tianjin Arsenal, and Changsha Arsenal are all engaged in large-scale production, and although these arsenals are all wholly owned by the royal family, they will still pay the relevant patent fees to the Linde Machinery Factory.

Later, the empire successively promulgated formal laws such as civil and commercial laws and criminal laws, which were also officially written into the patent law.

However, this kind of patent is only for domestic use, and the empire has not reached any agreement with other Western countries on patent protection, so if domestic companies copy the technological achievements of Western companies. At the same time, if Western companies have not yet applied for patents in China, and the patents are still preemptively registered by Chinese companies, the empire will not support foreign companies to defend their rights.

In other words, now the empire only recognizes patents registered in China, and does not recognize patents applied by enterprises in other countries.

The implementation of the Patent Law can effectively encourage enterprises and technicians to carry out in-depth technological innovation, and improve the income and social status of scientific researchers.

This is also the reason why so many companies in the empire have begun to invest in scientific research in recent years, because if you don't develop it now, you won't be able to use any new technology developed by competitors in a few years, and you will not have to lose money in market competition at that time.

After all, the overall industrial scale of the empire is now quite small. Moreover, because the industrial zone is quite concentrated, it is quite difficult for you to infringe on the cost in a large industrial zone, and as for what remote place to go to produce infringing products, this can only be left to be solved slowly later.

In such a big back' scene. Some large domestic enterprises have begun to invest part of their funds in the field of research and development, and the largest investment is the major industries of the royal family that Lin Zhe can directly control.

This is also related to the fact that the major enterprises under the royal industry are generally large in scale and rely more on technology.

For example, they are still burning money. The Xuzhou Railway Company, which will not see profit prospects for many years in the future, has not yet completed the Xuzhou test railway. But they already have a R&D center of more than 20 people, mainly for railways. R&D of trains and other related technologies.

Of course, this research and development is actually plagiarizing foreign technology, but plagiarism also requires technical ability.

There is also the Shanghai Textile Company, which has united with a number of other domestic raw silk industries with strong capital, and invested heavily in the related technologies of the raw silk industry, especially the cultivation of mulberry trees and silkworm seeds, hoping to obtain raw silk raw materials with higher yield and better quality, that is, silkworm cocoons.

However, these are all applied technology research, so the investment enthusiasm of enterprises is relatively high, but some purely theoretical research and non-governmental aspects are not very careful.

For example, even in the 21st century, physics is a typical frontier discipline, and the content of the projects studied by scientists will not see any obvious practical application possibilities for at least a few hundred or even thousands of years.

For example, Einstein's theory of relativity, Stephen Hawking's theory of black holes, can you get any benefits from conducting research on these physical theories?

This kind of scientific research, which is typical of inverted money, can only be supported by official or non-profit organizations!

And this is the biggest reason why Lin Zhe established the Royal Academy of Sciences, although a large part of the current projects in the Royal Academy of Sciences are still applied projects funded by major enterprises in the royal industry, but there are also many pure theoretical research directly funded by the royal family.

Physics, mathematics, and chemistry are the top priorities, while medicine, geography, and agriculture are also minor projects.

The research of the Royal Academy of Sciences is generally carried out in cooperation with the laboratories of Imperial University, Jiangnan University, and major companies, and many of them are professors and senior engineers of these institutions.

Su Zhicai, as the first student to return to China, is also a typical scientific research talent, so it is impossible for him to be arranged for officialdom, but was arranged to the Imperial University, as a teacher of physics, in addition to teaching, he also formally established the first electromagnetism research laboratory in China with the financial support of the Royal Academy of Sciences.

It can be expected that the follow-up Su Zhicai's life is basically inseparable from scientific research.

Unlike Su Zhicai, a scientific research talent, Han Qingsheng, who returned to China together, is a diplomat and a politician.

After he returned to Nanjing, Lin Zhe did not continue to send him to Britain as a minister, but because of his rich experience in Europe, he directly made him the co-minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the director of the European Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, mainly responsible for European foreign affairs.

The Imperial Embassy in Britain was appointed by the former Director of the European Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and at the same time, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs officially sent the first Minister to the Imperial Embassy in Paris, as the former Vice-Consul of the Empire in London.

At the same time, due to the formal conclusion of trade negotiations between the empire and many European countries such as Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands in the first half of the year, and the formal signing of trade and other related friendly cooperation agreements, these trade agreements are basically normal commercial and trade treaties, and the empire opened its existing treaty ports to the above-mentioned countries, and these countries also formally opened their markets to the empire, and promised to reduce tariffs on traditional Chinese export goods such as raw silk, porcelain, and tea.

By August 1860, the empire had reached commercial agreements with most European countries except Russia, and had established diplomatic relations one after another.

However, although the empire has established diplomatic relations with them, considering that the empire has not many diplomatic talents, and at present, only Britain and France have more diplomatic ties with the empire, and considering Southeast Asia, then only the Netherlands and Spain have some contacts, and the diplomatic ties of Germany, Belgium, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Austria-Hungary and other countries are quite few.

In order to reduce the cost of maintaining diplomacy on the European side and reduce the number of diplomatic personnel, the empire set up only small offices in Germany, the Netherlands, and Spain, in addition to the official legations at the level of ministers in London and Paris, and only two or three people were stationed on weekdays.

The diplomatic affairs of the above-mentioned countries, with the exception of the Imperial Minister to France, which is an independent body and directly responsible to the Imperial Foreign Ministry, are all under the supervision of the Minister in England.

In addition to Europe, the empire also established a legation in New York, which supervised foreign affairs with Mexico and other countries in the Americas, in addition to dealing with the United States.

At present, the Imperial Foreign Ministry has only established legations in London, Paris, and New York, and has offices in a small number of European countries.

The reason why there is no embassy in every country that has diplomatic relations is because there is a serious shortage of qualified diplomats in the empire at present, and the diplomatic funds are not very sufficient.

First of all, you have to know French, which is the common language of diplomacy today, and in addition to French, you also have to know some local language, for example, if you are engaged in foreign affairs in Germany, can you not speak German?

For example, there are many industries in Shanghai that have more contact with foreign trade, such as the raw silk industry, many people can speak English, so let them speak English with a London accent, but if you let them speak French with a standard Parisian accent, it is quite difficult.

After all, the coverage of English is far greater than that of French today, but what is quite frustrating is that the standard language of diplomacy in these days is French, and diplomats generally speak French in public, even the diplomats of the United Kingdom, the leader of the contemporary world.

In international negotiations, if you speak English, no one will pay attention to you!

The shortage of French-speaking personnel has to a certain extent contributed to the shortage of full-time diplomatic personnel. (To be continued.) )