I don't think even the Cultural Revolution or anything else Mao did had much of an effect on Nobel prize-worthy research, simply because there wasn't much to disrupt to begin with. In terms of education, the biggest change was in secondary school enrollment, which more than doubled during the Cultural Revolution before dropping back down, which I assume represents people staying students for longer instead of graduating, rather than an expansion of access. University education remained a rarity for long after that, only surpassing 10% enrollment in 2002: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/primary-secondary-enrollm...
I guess we'll see Chinese scientists winning Nobels at a rate commensurate with other big countries in 20–40 years or so.
I guess we'll see Chinese scientists winning Nobels at a rate commensurate with other big countries in 20–40 years or so.