Horizons Expanded, a Life Changed, and Hope for Future Generations
“I left Dartmouth with a better understanding of myself, I had explored the meaning of life, and I had a stronger heart.”
Twenty years after completing his PhD, Keene still has his Dartmouth “Molecules in the Mountains” T-shirt.
Yanjun Wei GR’04—known to his Dartmouth friends by the nickname Keene—completed his PhD in chemistry 20 years ago. Within two years of graduating from Dartmouth, Keene established a research and development lab that would become Viwit Pharmaceuticals, an international biopharmaceutical firm. Keene serves as Viwit’s president and chief executive officer, and he resides in Shanghai. Despite the many responsibilities of overseeing a growing business that operates across the globe, Dartmouth is never far from his mind. Here he shares some Dartmouth memories and honors one professor who was particularly influential.
After more than 20 years, I still vividly remember and remain deeply grateful to my PhD advisor and mentor Professor David Lemal and Dartmouth. I spent five wonderful years in Hanover. I hope my story demonstrates the importance and profound effects of a Dartmouth liberal arts education for a young student from China.
Having grown up in a small village near the Russian border in the northeastern corner of Helongjiang province, I was a long way from home in Hanover when I arrived in September 1999. I was to spend the next half decade growing intellectually and, just as importantly, as a more complete person. My years at Dartmouth totally changed my life.
I had graduated from Peking University and applied to Dartmouth’s PhD program to study organic chemistry. Imagine my delight when I received a call at my home in Heilongjiang from Professor Lemal asking me if I would like to join his research group.
I will never forget arriving in Hanover for the first time. Professor Lemal greeted me as I stepped off the Dartmouth Coach and took me under his wing. Tall, thin, and bald, he spoke with a heavy nasal sound and deep voice that I could barely understand. Born in 1934, he was one year younger than my grandfather. With his warmth and patience, however, he made me feel welcomed and at ease. He exemplified the friendly Dartmouth culture that I grew to love and embrace.
Professor Lemal had an international reputation in the field of fluorine chemistry. He had studied at Harvard under the legendary chemistry professor and Nobel Prize winner R.B. Woodward. My colleagues in our chemistry research group all admired Professor Lemal for his academic rigor and also for his kindness and frugality. I remember that he drove an old red Hyundai Elantra while another, more junior professor drove a shiny BMW.
The Department of Chemistry at Dartmouth is small and only admits fewer than ten graduate students every year. It’s rigorous, requiring five qualification examinations in the first two years. Professor Lemal encouraged me during these challenging times and shared my excitement when I passed the PhD qualification examination in the shortest time in the department’s history.
My research centering on fluorine chemistry proved difficult and discouraging at times. My colleagues and I would discuss our projects each Thursday over cookies and drinks. It was a lively intellectual atmosphere.
As my time at Dartmouth passed, I was enriched intellectually and I grew as a person. I became determined to experience all that Dartmouth offered. I read more than 200 books that I borrowed from the library, encompassing everything from history, biography, and psychology to business and philosophy. I attended lectures by eminent professors, visiting scholars, and business leaders and absorbed so much. I skied at Killington and volunteered at Northern Stage in White River Junction, making so many new friends.
Just before Commencement, the department gave each PhD graduate a green T-shirt with the logo “Molecules in the Mountains,” which had been drawn by Professor Lemal. What a perfect Dartmouth emblem.
I left Dartmouth with a better understanding of myself, I had explored the meaning of life, and I had a stronger heart. My Dartmouth experience gave me very valuable training in persistence and critical thinking in science, a global and open-minded mindset, and a higher-level consciousness, all in search of meaning in life and the wisdom of living. Not only were the education and experience enlightening for me, but I met some of my best friends and the nicest people during those five years! The experience also laid the foundation for my ambition to combine science, innovation, and entrepreneurship together to start up an innovation-driven company, in pursuit of self-actualization and to make a difference. My schoolmates and friends, and most of all my respected mentor, Professor Lemal, were instrumental in expanding my horizons so widely. They were the most memorable five years of my life.
I returned to China and founded two pharmaceutical companies, first Viwit Pharmaceuticals, and later Vitsgen Therapeutics, of which I am the CEO. I have a loving family in Shanghai and remain engaged with the Dartmouth community.
At a time when the relationship between our two countries has been tense and troubled, I cherish my Dartmouth memories and my fortunate fate in life. Both China and the U.S. should continue to encourage such interactions. Their cultural, scientific, and business interaction and interchange are beneficial to the citizens of both countries, and their open-minded policy to co-development and healthy competition is key to global peace and prosperity of the human race in the 21st century. I fervently hope that more young people will be able share the same sort of experience that I had!