Wen Roujia (L) receives the Young Inventors’ Prize awarded by the European Patent Office (EPO) in Reykjavik, Iceland’s capital city, Wednesday.

Wen, the first Chinese to win this honor, and her collaborator Alisha Fredriksson received the prize for developing a retrofittable carbon capture system that enables shipowners to reduce emissions without replacing their existing fleets. They were among the top 10 innovators in the 2025 Young Inventors’ Prize competition, selected from over 450 candidates from five continents, according to the EPO.Xinhua