Nobel prizes in physics are awarded typically with lag of 20-30 years. In early 2000s China was still a relative backwater economically (and academically). In 2000 US R&D spending was over 8 times China's. Now China has likely surpassed USA. It surpassed EU already in about 2014.

Working in academia, the rise of China academically is palpable. There's an avalance of Chinese research published, and a reasonable chunk of it very high quality, and getting better.

https://www.statista.com/chart/20553/gross-domestic-expendit...

https://itif.org/publications/2025/06/30/china-outpacing-us-...