On February 19, the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB) announced the list of newly elected fellows for this year. Professor Zhang Xuegong from the Institute of Information Processing of the Department of Automation was included in the list, becoming the first Chinese scholar to be selected.

Founded in 1997, the ISCB is the largest international academic organization in the fields of bioinformatics and computational biology. Its mission is to promote the understanding of living systems through computation and the scientific progress across the world. ISCB Fellows program aims to recognize outstanding members who have made significant contributions to the fields of computational biology and bioinformatics. The selection criteria are based on the importance of the scientific contributions made by these scholars. A total of 12 scientists were elevated to the grade of fellow this year.

Since the outbreak of COVID-19, academics in China have received a lot of well-wishes from international counterparts and friends. On March 6, Professor Zhang Xuegong, Director of the Bioinformatics and Artificial Life Committee of the Chinese Association for Artificial Intelligence, Executive Deputy Director of the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology Committee of the Chinese Society of Biotechnology and Executive Editor of Quantitative Biology, wrote to the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB), thanking his international colleagues for their concern and support. He also provided information on epidemic control measures in China and highlighted the positive contributions of Chinese computational biologists to the response and research of the epidemic.

On 11 March, Professor Thomas Lengauer, president of the ISCB, replied to the letter, thanking Professor Zhang Xuegong for the information he shared with the Society. He highly appreciated the importance of timely research and data sharing in the early stage of the epidemic and hoped that the Society will contribute to COVID-19 research by providing a platform of sharing papers, data and other information with international peers. He also wished the Chinese scholars an early recovery from the epidemic.