Sergey Ivanov, Professor at the Department of Technosphere Safety and Analytical Chemistry at the Institute of Chemistry and Chemical-Pharmaceutical Technologies at Altai State University, was named one of China’s top ten foreign talents in Shaoxing, Zhejiang Province, China.
Sergey Ivanov has gained recognition as a leading expert in materials science. In 2025, Russia launched the national project "New Materials and Chemistry" aimed to develop innovative technologies and implement them in industrial production to produce new products and stimulate advanced research in various fields. Altai State University has joined this project. Sergey Ivanov has extensive experience in implementing new products. In 2024, he was invited to China as a top researcher to the Innovation Center for Modern Textile Technologies (Jianhu Laboratory) and the Hubei Key Laboratory of Digital Textile Machinery (Wuhan Textile University).
"Our division focuses on textile equipment design. I'm a leading researcher, and I specialize in metals and advanced materials. I act as a scientific consultant at the center, helping designers select the right materials and processing technology to achieve the best combination of required properties, like strength, wear resistance, and others. In turn, it improves equipment productivity and other features.
Every year, the city of Shaoxing (Zhejiang Province) hosts a ceremony honoring top foreign talents — experts from many countries working in China. The city has about 6 million people, which isn't particularly large by Chinese standards. About 1,500 foreigners work there, and 2,460 in the entire province. They select the top 10 each year. The exact criteria are unclear, but Chinese colleagues say they consider scientific publications and the company’s annual revenue growth.
This year, I ranked in the top ten and received the Friendship Medal — a beautiful statuette inlaid with a real pearl. China values scientists highly, and the profession earns great respected. This makes sense — the average time from idea to implementation of innovations in production in China is 6-8 months. The government has set a goal to cut this time to 3-4 months by 2030. As a result, Chinese people clearly see how new technologies are transforming the world, raising living standards and improving well-being for everyone. Our center specializes in full-cycle textile equipment design: from initial concepts and engineering to pilot prototypes, testing, and a full set of technical documentation necessary for mass production. Approximately 50% of the Center's employees are final-year undergraduate and graduate students. Here, they complete their pre-graduation internships, gaining real scientific and industrial experience, and earning competitive pay, sometimes above the average in mechanical engineering. Students from Wuhan Textile University and Zhejiang University of Science and Technology compete fiercely for these positions; they truly recruit only the best.
Sergey Ivanov belongs to the scientific school of Professor A. M. Guryev, a renowned expert both in Russia and abroad. He is listed in the Federal Register of Experts in Scientific and Technical Fields. His main research focuses on the development of thermal and thermochemical treatments for steels and alloys, especially multicomponent boriding. In simply terms, these are ceramic coatings literally "grown" on parts from four main components: the most important of which, in addition to the part material itself, are boron, chromium, and titanium. They boost wear resistance and lifespan by 2-3 times, with a record-breaking 50-fold increase! For example, one of his clients is the battery recycling company Mokvin. The hardened knives used to shred used batteries raised their capacity from 8 to 120 tons. Ivanov has also developed and patented a boriding technology for precision parts, enhancing wear resistance without losing dimensional accuracy. An important aspect of his research is the study and development of modern heat treatment technologies for steels and alloys to improve strength and ductility.
At Altai State University, Sergei Ivanov teaches engineering graphics and descriptive geometry with a practical focus, using modern CAD systems for automated design. In the future, the scientist plans to join various research projects at the Institute of Chemistry and Chemical-Pharmaceutical Technologies aimed at developing new materials, functional coatings, and processing technologies.