How China is using science fiction to spur innovation in the country

In addition to popularizing science, China is also changing the way the subject is taught

Twenty-year-old Hua Xia waits patiently in a Beijing conference hall for his chance to chat about alien invasions with Liu Cixin, China’s most-popular science fiction writer who counts Barack Obama and Mark Zuckerberg among his readers.

Carrying a book he hopes to have autographed, Hua explains it was Liu’s novel “The Three-Body Problem” that led him to decide to study aircraft design.

“Science fiction has a power to call on your spirit,” said Hua, who is now a sophomore at Beihang University in Beijing. “It shows me the most imaginative, enchanting and exciting part of science. That makes me believe that working