Nearly 140 scientists will attend the 3rd World Laureates Forum in Shanghai from October 30 to November 1.

Winners of the Nobel Prize, Turing Award, Fields Medal,LaskerMedical Research Awards and other top scientific awards will give over 130 speeches and attend summits in basic sciences such as physics and chemistry as well as hot topics such as artificial intelligence, precise treatment and new energy.

Of them, 61 are Nobel Prize laureates, including two of this year’swinners — HarveyAlter, the American virologist whose work led to the discovery of the hepatitis C virus, and AndreaGhez, the American astronomer who discovered thesupermassiveblack hole known as Sagittarius A* in the Milky Way galaxy. They will be attending the forum for the first time.

Others includeSheperdDoeleman, director of the Event Horizon Telescope which captured the first image of a black hole, and KipThorne, the American theoretical physicist who won 2017 Nobel Prize in Physics and was scientific consultant on movie blockbusters “Interstellar” and “Tenet.”

This year’s forum will focus on the global concerns surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic.

It will invite the world’s leading virologists, including Harvey Alter and Harald zur Hausen, to discuss the anti-virus fight. Seven winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics, including EricMaskin, ThomasSargentand Christopher Pissarides,will share their views on economic resurgence after the pandemic.

The forum will also focus on relations between humans and nature in topics such as disasters, biological variety and climate change. Cutting-edge technologies in new materials, artificial intelligence and quantum science will also be a highlight.

The opening ceremony will be held on October 30 at the Shanghai International Convention Center inLujiazui.

Due to COVID-19, most of the overseas scientists will attend the forum through online platforms.

RogerKornberg, chairman of the World Laureates Association and winner of the 2006 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, and MichaelLevitt, vice chairman of the association and winner of the 2013 Nobel Prize in chemistry, have arrived Shanghai and will attend the forum in person.

The forum’s official website wlf2020.wlaforum.com was launched on Tuesday. It will providelivestreamsand reviews of 71 activities in 150 hours of video. The content is free to watch.