On August 3, a delegation of 17 experts including Lu Jianhua, Deputy Director of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC), Zhang Zhaotian, Executive Deputy Director of the Ministry of Information Science of NSFC, Li Jianjun, Deputy Director of the Ministry of Information Science of NSFC, and Academician Sun Youxian, Lead of the Academic Experts Committee, visited ECUST for on-site inspection of the Basic Science Center Program of  Intelligent Optimization and Control Mechanism for Material Conversion-based Manufacturing Process .

Du Huifang, Secretary of the Party Committee of ECUST, first expressed a warm welcome to the leaders and experts. She also said that the ECUST had been attaching great importance to the Basic Science Center Program and will fully support the construction of the Program in the University from such aspects as capital investment, hardware construction, system reform, and talent guarantee. Lu Jianhua introduced the background of the Basic Science Center Program and pointed out that the construction of the Basic Science Center Program should be high, far and practical. High means to be absolutely ahead in the world, far means to have a long-term goal, and practical means that the goal set for the program must be realizable. On behalf of the program team, Academician Qian Feng made a report on research direction and content, research plan and expected goals of the program to be carried out in the next 5 years, and answered questions from experts. After that, accompanied by Qu Jingping, leaders and experts from the NSFC conducted an on-site inspection on ECUST 's smart refinery manufacturing system, ethylene virtual factory, chemical substance conversion experimental device, and bio-material conversion experimental device.

The expert team highly recognized research significance and feasibility of the research objectives, and thought highly of the implementation basis, guarantee and support ECUST has made. It was agreed by the experts that the program had met the value proposition and requirements of the Basic Science Center of the NSFC, and they recommended the program to start as soon as possible.