Screenshot from the China Adolescents Science and Technology Innovation contest official website

A sixth-grade student in Southwest China's Yunnan Province whose research into cancer won a national-level award has become embroiled in controversy after he was found to have little knowledge of biology and his research bore similarity to a program conducted by an Institute of Zoology where his father works as a researcher, reported CCTV on Tuesday.

The work of the pupil focuses on a colorectal cancer related gene study, and won third prize at a prestigious annual event that attracts around 10 million young contestants nationwide every year.

However, the complexity of the research and the vast biological basis it required led to suspicion of fraud, as the young author indicated in his experiment notes that he had to do an internet search to find out what genes are when he started his research.

Two corresponding authors of the study were later found to work at the Kunming institute of zoology, whose independent research shares a similar direction with the controversial study.