As technology transforms the healthcare industry, more and more universities are offering degree programs in biomedical engineering to position themselves in the smart healthcare industry ecosystem. National Tsing Hua University (NTHU) and National Central University (NCU) with robust research strength in science, engineering, ICT and other technologies further leverage cross-sector integration and the Ministry of Science and Technology's (MOST) Global Research and Industry Alliance (GLORIA) program to actively tap industry resources and connect with market needs. Through reciprocal interactions, they look to lead Taiwan's developments in precision medicine, personalized medicine and eHealth to expand globally and build a world-class healthcare ecosystem.NTHU's research achievements in precision and personalized medicineNTHU enjoys a wealth of research resources in engineering, power mechanics, semiconductor as well as arts and humanities. Its proximity to the Hsinchu Science Park gives it a geographical advantage in connecting with the local high-tech cluster. According to Trong-young Lin, CEO, GLORIA Operation Center, NTHU, under MOST's GLORIA initiative to help integrate cross-sector resources, NTHU focuses on researches in smart manufacturing, biomedical technology, semiconductor, IoT and cultural creations. By enabling industry experts to discover the university's research strength and high-caliber R&D teams, NTHU successfully bridges the academia with the industry and has thereby engaged in more value-added innovations for the "Big Healthcare" industry.Hygeia Touch, a startup founded by an NTHU research team, has jointly developed the world's first COVID-19 rapid test kit for clinical use with a group of researchers led by Professor Chao-Min Cheng, Institute of Biomedical Engineering, NTHU and Tri-Service General Hospital. The test is conducted by placing a drop of a patient's serum onto a test strip to measure the cytokine interleukin-6 (IL-6) concentration. It can determine within two minutes if the patient's condition is about to become severe so that medical professionals can take early action to treat the patient. The test kit was just announced in June 2020 and immediately grabbed the healthcare industry's attention.According to NTHU, the test kit is undergoing clinical trials through collaboration with medical institutions including hospitals in Italy. To accelerate its use by frontline healthcare workers, it has also been submitted for an emergency use authorization (EUA) by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and will go to market upon FDA approval.Another NTHU-incubated startup, Cell Envision, has developed a circulating tumor cell (CTC) monitoring system. It generally takes six to twelve months of follow-up routine tests after surgery to detect metastasis in a cancer patient. Cell Envision's system can perform monthly checks to more precisely assess the risks of cancer recurrence and metastasis. Cell Envision attended the Innovation Challenge at the Redefining Early Stage Investments (RESI) held in Philadelphia in 2019 and was listed as one of the top finalists for its research achievement.Innovations that will also be on exhibit at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020 include NexVita Technology's high-precision VSA artery spectral analysis technology, a brain damage study and drug screening platform co-developed with Hualien Tzu Chi Hospital, a portable rapid sensing device for cardiovascular diseases introduced by Professor Yu-Lin Wang, Institute of NaoEngineering and MicroSystems, NTHU alongside a dozen more physical products and cutting-edge research results.Engaging in healthcare research, NCU aims to enable preventive medicineOn the foundation of its strong science and engineering programs, NCU began to foray into research in healthcare, medical materials and other biotechnologies in recent years and is seeing its efforts generating results. Under MOST's support, NCU and Dutch firm DSM announced the plan to establish a joint R&D center in March 2020. By 2021, about 40 DSM researchers will be working at the center based in NCU. The partnership will help infuse an international firm's energy into NCU's research in biomedical materials to accelerate NCU's development toward high-quality preventive medicine on a global scale.The signing ceremony for the NCU-DSM joint R&D center collaboration will be held at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020. The partnership marks a major milestone in NCU's industry-academia collaboration endeavors.According to Kwang-Hwa Lii, executive vice president, NCU, who is also in charge of NCU GLORIA, the collaboration with DSM, a green chemical producer based in the Netherlands, is of symbolic importance to the university's critical material development. The two parties will combine forces in chemistry and material R&D while tapping the research strength of NCU's biomedical sciences faculty to undertake additional industry-academia collaboration projects targeting preventive medicine including multi-functional drugs and materials for medical purpose coating.NCU will present five exhibits demonstrating its research achievements at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020, including professor Chen-Han Huang's portable allergen testing device iEAT, professor Shu-Chen Liu's application of first-generation spontaneously immortalized oral cancer cell line in translational medicine, professor Rong-Seng Chang's optical tremor analysis device for detection of Parkinson's Disease, professor Yi-Chiung Hsu's advanced bionic dynamic culture technology integrated with next-generation AI analysis platform, and professor Ssu-Ching Chen's high-efficiency performance dechlorination gel.Take the portable allergen testing device iEAT for example. Food allergies are on the rise and doctors often rely on blood tests to diagnose allergies and find allergens. Built with nanotechnology and special material, iEAT is about the size of a key chain. Not only is it convenient and portable, but it also detects allergens within two minutes at 1ppm sensitivity, comparable to internationally recognized enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) conducted in laboratories. All the test results can be uploaded to the cloud via IoT technologies for AI-based computation and analysis. It serves as an ideal instrument for preventive and personalized medicine.Taiwan not only has first-rate medical professionals and provides world-leading healthcare quality but also fosters a manufacturing ecosystem that is internationally acclaimed. Under MOST's GLORIA initiative, NTHU and NCU get to integrate resources and demonstrate Taiwan's innovation energy to the world from a higher perspective and fresh point of view. Driven by "Big Healthcare" industry developments, Taiwan's industry and academia will engage in closer collaborations and more partnerships with global biotechnology communities.Cell Envision was listed among the finalists of the Innovation Challenge at the Redefining Early Stage Investments 2019. Photo: NTHUThe NCU GLORIA team Photo: NCU

With a rapidly growing number of high-tech firms and startups scrambling into research and development combining healthcare and artificial intelligence (AI), targeting the new "AIoH" blue ocean market, National Yang Ming University (NYMU) and Taipei Medical University (TMU) are endeavoring to incorporate advanced technologies including big data analytics, cloud computing and ICT innovations, and engage additional academia-industry collaborations to accelerate the creation of Taiwan's smart healthcare industry chain and a whole new healthcare ecosystem for the realization of home care, remote care, personalized medicine and precision medicine.NYMU achieves outstanding results with its efforts toward AI-based brain science researchThrough coordination and connection across the industry, government, academia and medical profession, NYMU GLORIA will be showcasing its research results in "AI for Medical" at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020. Aside from co-exhibiting with eight NYMU-incubated firms and leading food manufacturing firm Laurel, NYMU will have professor Jin Wu Tsai and professor Albert C Yang from its Institute of Brain Science present AI applications in healthcare including screening tests that identify neurodevelopmental disorder-associated genes and a diagnostic system for assessing psychiatric disorders.In a report published by information service company Clarivate in April 2020, NYMU is listed as the most active institute in neuroscience research in Taiwan. In view of dementia as an age-related neurodegenerative disorder, Tsai carries his industry experience further and works with his team to build dementia cell and mouse models for testing. Moreover, Tsai's team is the first in the academic circle to use transposon-mediated somatic mutagenesis to identify 30 genes that are potentially involved in brain malformations. They have also developed two-photon microscopy, which is an advanced technique to visualize microscopic structures in the deep tissue and detect neuronal activities in live animals as well as an algorithm to analyze the 3D structure of cerebral cortex synapses and identify areas of neuron synapse degeneration. They have had 27 papers published in international journals including Neuron, Nature Communications and Developmental Cell in just eight years.Seeing that mental health disorders are generally determined based on doctors' subjective assessment, as a psychiatrist and researcher, Yang aims to improve the lack of objective standards in psychiatric diagnosis. He led a team of researchers to develop a structural brain imaging system for psychiatric disorders diagnosis. Using algorithms and deep learning networks to analyze brain MRI images of potential patients and healthy adults, the AI-based system can help with psychiatric diagnosis. Leveraging data analytics, the system currently achieves a more than 90% accuracy, providing clinical reference value for the diagnosis of mental health disorders such as schizophrenia.NYMU Business Center of Industry-Academia Liaison (BCIAL) and NYMU GLORIA CEO Monica Bey noted that NYMU is committed to bringing the university's biotechnology research achievements to commercialization and integrating BCIAL and GLORIA resources to enhance collaboration across the industry, government, academia, and medical profession to create branding effects. As part of MOST's GLORIA program, NYMU works with Laurel to develop dietary supplement "Delicious and Powerlifting Soup" for older adults. The program also facilitated the licensing of the patented therapy for treating head and neck cancers developed by Muh-Hwa Yang, vice president of NYMU and faculty member of Institute of Clinical Medicine, NYMU, to Asclepiumm Taiwan, a novel peptide drug developer. The deal arrived at an amount of tens of millions of NT dollars.In March 2020, CEO Monica Bey invited Marco Lin to come aboard as industrial liaison manager, aiming to leverage his experience in scientific research, business corporations and institutional investors to help conduct an inventory check on NYMU's research achievements using Technology Readiness Level (TRL), a standard commonly adopted in the technology sector. Based on this, NYMU will have scientific and quantifiable data about its research achievements in terms of technological maturity, market application and technology transfer risks when in talks with business corporations and institutional investors for partnership opportunities. In May 2020, NYMU further joined forces with leading ICT manufacturer Asustek Computer to establish an "AI for Medical" program for academia-industry collaboration driving cross-sector R&D, talent incubation and industry connection and thereby turn a new page for Taiwan's biomedical technology development.TMU's innovations accelerate hospital transformationTMU plans to organize seven themed exhibits at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020, featuring TMU SPARK unique technologies, the university's own patented researches, TMU GLORIA, TMU-incubated startups, TMU Biomed Accelerator, TMU biomed business group, and intramural service center.Through the GLORIA, Academia-Industry Collaboration and SPARK programs, TMU has fostered 10 startups in digital health, AI and medical device fields. Among them, four will present their creations at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020, including Guzip Biomarkers, Cytoarm, JunHong Biotechnology and tYDS Biotech. Guzip Biomarkers, founded in 2018, is dedicated to the study of Epigenetics. Its MPap test DNA Methylation Detection Kit is intended to verify the risk of endometrial cancer and is marketed in Taiwan by TSH Biopharm through an exclusive licensing agreement. MPap test is provided to patients at Shuang Ho Hospital as an optional item at the patient's own expense. Attempting to resolve the problem of conventional root canal filling material taking too long to harden and being too difficult to handle, tYDS Biotech has developed SavDen MTA, which is Taiwan's first locally produced root canal filling material, based on molecular engineering and biomedical material research. JunHong Biotechnology, co-founded by a TMU team and Lord Duke, markets a mangosteen supplemental drink, which is the first mangosteen product to receive the Food and Drug Administration health food approval to help maintain normal blood sugar levels. JunHong is able to extract, purify and volume produce α-mangostin, which is the main compound in mangosteen fruits to provide the health benefits and also a health ingredient JunHong produces. Focusing on precisely promoting health for all, JunHong endeavors to expand Taiwan's dietary supplement offerings. Cytoarm is a developer of novel drugs recently incorporated in 2020, dedicated to the research of highly targeted bispecific antibodies for cancer treatment.TMU SPARK provides comprehensive services to help the university's research teams commercialize their achievements. The exhibits at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020 organized by TMU SPARK will encompass EPICAn , a precision blood test for early detection of breast cancer developed by Professor Ruo-Kai Lin's team. The test is the world's first to utilize an automated process to perform epigenetics analysis on liquid biopsy for early detection of breast cancer. Also to be presented by TMU SPARK is ASAP, a system for risk assessment of radiation therapy on cerebral arteriovenous malformation (AVM) developed by Assistant Professor Syu-Jyun Peng's team in collaboration with Taipei Veterans General Hospital. Using automated medical image segmentation with fuzzy c-means clustering, the system can help reduce the risks of complications after stereotactic radiosurgery on AVM patients, including brain tissue necrosis, cerebral edema and epilepsy. According to TMU, there are potential partnership opportunities to work with leading radiation therapy instrument manufacturers such as US-based GE Healthcare, Siemens Healthcare, Japan-based Toshiba Medical Systems Corporation and Sweden-based Elekta to build risk assessment modules based on Professor Peng's research results.Healthcare today has expanded beyond hospital care. The incorporation of smart healthcare and digital health will reshape hospital care. According to TMU, MOST's GLORIA program has increased TMU's visibility, attracting third party or industry attention and allowing TMU to start a positive cycle of academia-industry collaboration. TMU faculty members that used to concentrate on their own academic research now learn to integrate resources and connect TMU with AI, digital health, medical supply and pharmaceutical firms to create a complete biomedical industry ecosystem. For this purpose, TMU Biomed Accelerator will hold an opening ceremony and co-host TMU X BE Demo Day with BE Accelerator on July 23, 2020. Ten selected teams from digital health, AI and medical device fields will present their achievements resulting from six months of efforts combining clinical resources, match-making research and academic teams and guidance by biomedical experts and global mentors. Speakers from Internationally renowned programs including Japan Biodesign and Singapore Biodesign will also join the event and shed light on new biomedical knowledge and creations.AI-enabled biomedical advances will redefine healthcare systems and services while spurring the next wave of biomedical industry growth. Riding the AIoH wave, NYMU with the neighboring Taipei Veterans General Hospital and TMU with three affiliated hospitals including Taipei Medical University Hospital, Wanfang Hospital and Shuang Ho Hospital are in a strong position to become ideal testing grounds for smart healthcare transformation. This advantage combined with MOST's GLORIA program to bridge the academia and industry and integrate resources will enable NYMU and TMU to dig deeper into their creativity and spark ideas that can turn into research achievements with global competitiveness. Their efforts will help Taiwan upgrade its smart healthcare industry and capture rising opportunities at the critical time of global transformation to play an influential role in Asia Pacific's biomedical technology scene.The NYMU GLORIA teamPhoto: NYMUTMU assistant professor Syu-Jyun PengPhoto: TMU

Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020, which opens on July 22, 2020, will be held in an unprecedented "Online + Live" format. The event will be the first global biotechnology conference taking place in Asia amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Global Research & Industry Alliance National Cheng Kung University (GLORIA NCKU) and Chang Gung University (CGU) from the International Intelligent Biotech and Medical Alliance have made leaping advances in epidemic prevention research. Their front-running research achievements in body temperature monitoring, surgical masks and virus testing stand a good chance of being marketed worldwide and tapping the multi-billion-dollar virus prevention market.NCKU's HEARThermo smart wristband featured in international journalGLORIA NCKU will showcase its achievements in three theme areas including COVID-19 prevention, in vitro diagnostic (IVD) devices and remote healthcare at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020. Its exhibits encompass multiple applications and products which are the results of industry-academia collaborations, demonstrating Taiwan's potential in medical biotechnology research for the world to see.According to professor Woei-Jer Chuang, associate vice president of NCKU and director NCKU's Transfer and Business Incubation Center, the university established its Center of Infectious Disease and Signaling Research in 2011, the first of such research institutes in Taiwan. Dedicated to the study of viruses including enterovirus 71 and Dengue virus, the center has accumulated years of research experiences and resources on infectious disease research. NCKU's Department of Biomedical Engineering will be among the university team hosting exhibits at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020 to showcase its portable platform for rapid infectious disease testing, which can quickly identify highly infective patients of Dengue fever.Since its establishment under the support of the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) in 2017, GLORIA NCKU has stayed focused on three main areas: healthcare and biotechnology; smart devices; and green energy and materials. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, NCKU's team comprising healthcare, engineering and ICT specialists introduced a smart continuous real-time body temperature monitoring system, which combines the HEARThermo wristband for constant body temperature monitoring and AI algorithms for abnormally high temperature detection. The device has been worn by more than 460 frontline and supporting healthcare workers as well as patients since the onset of the COVID-19 outbreak. The report on the use of the system in COVID-19 control and prevention has been published in the renowned Journal of Microbiology, Immunology and Infection. GLORIA NCKU has also received online inquiries from a New York hospital, and from Irish and British firms about the system. The team has also founded a startup NightingaleAI with a focus on CareAI services to continuingly develop high-tech epidemic prevention solutions. Multiple ICT device manufacturers looking to expand into smart healthcare have expressed interest in investment deals.As part of its plan to expand into the healthcare sector, Qisda approached NCKU for industry-academia research collaboration. Its subsidiary BenQ Medical Technology engages in a partnership project with NCKU-supported startup Meet Tec to manufacture coating production equipment based on Meet Tec's patented technology, which can apply coating materials onto surfaces of different characteristics. The technology can be used to help manufacturers of wide-ranging products, such as high-end surgical masks, air filters, baby diapers, feminine hygiene products, protective clothing and electronic devices, enabling anti-bacterial and anti-virus properties for their products. These products are also marketed through BenQ Medical Technology's sales network. The partnership project is a perfect example of an industry-academia collaboration result going to market.More startup firms will present their solutions at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020, including MediVisionTech's upper gastrointestinal (UGI) bleeding monitoring system. A tiny endoscope with a camera is placed in the stomach via the nasal tunnel. It is connected to a wearable host with image transmission capability. The system constantly monitors images of the stomach for precise and real-time detection of early and post-operative bleeding. Yutech will also exhibit its home care solution, which is a continuously operating heart rate monitor based on a low-power consumption ECG signal sensing module coupled with Bluetooth 5.0 transmission to send data to a remote device.Having collected Taiwan's most comprehensive virus database, CGU makes contribution to global public healthFor its proximity to the Taoyuan International Airport, Chang Gung University (CGU) is selected as a designated coronavirus testing center to help guard Taiwan's borders against COVID-19. CGU's Research Center for Emerging Viral Infections, in charge of coronavirus testing, joined the International Intelligent Biotech and Medical Alliance in 2019. The center will present its platform technology for detecting antiviral efficacy at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020. Having collected more than half of Taiwan's virus strains, the center holds a valuable virus database, which has attracted the attention of biotechnology firms and venture capitalists.Antiviral efficacy detection uses cells to test and analyze a product's ability to suppress multiple types of viruses. It provides a way for quantification of virus activity, such as plaque reduction assay, to evaluate a product's ability to kill or suppress virus. Take COVID-19 for example. The center has completed DNA sequencing for 32 COVID-19 strains and isolated antibodies from infected patients for 25 strains. The center has three research papers on COVID-19 published respectively in Journal of Clinical Microbiology, Emerging Microbes and Infections and Nature Structure and Molecular Biology.Furthermore, the center has long engaged in the study of viruses that are likely to mutate and cause a widespread outbreak, such as enterovirus, influenza virus and avian influenza virus. It has built animal models of enterovirus 71 and influenza virus infection, so it can help assess vaccine and drug efficacy on animals, provide comprehensive virus detection in cells or animals and support later stage development with lab data.Comprising a group of 50 researchers, the Research Center for Emerging Viral Infections has been in operation for more than a decade since its establishment in 2008. It has engaged in 14 academic exchange and research programs with foreign educational institutions as well as industry-academia collaboration projects with dozens of biotechnology firms every year, including Panion & BF Biotech, Seeing Bioscience, Formosa Biomedical Technology, Far East Bio-Tec, Trentron, Green & Safe and Orange House. Multiple products for influenza virus testing, enterovirus testing and hand soap antiviral efficacy assessment are being marketed as a result of these collaborations. The center even expanded internationally by signing a technology transfer agreement to license its enterovirus viral gene expression plasmid to Singapore-based vaccine company Sun Biotech.The International Intelligent Biotech and Medical Alliance will further invigorate the center's industry-academia collaboration energy by helping the team led by the center's director Shin-Ru Shih tap more forward-looking international resources and make advances in antiviral efficacy assessment services, test kits, vaccine development services and broad-spectrum antiviral drug research. As part of its initiative to foster startups, the alliance has introduced the center to multiple domestic and international medical testing solution providers and pharmaceutical firms which have expressed interest and actively engaged in talks.As a member of the Chang Gung Memorial Hospital Group, CGU has access to clinical trial platforms and healthcare technologies. Its International Intelligent Biotech and Medical Alliance was approved and established in August 2019 with an aim to focus on vertically-integrated, high-quality laboratory animal services, DNA sequencing, translational biomedical engineering, testing bio-chips, long-term care, smart healthcare and unique virus strain testing for vaccine production. More than 20 domestic and international enterprises including Infineon and Medigen Vaccine Biologics have signed up to become members of the alliance.CGU will make its debut at Bio Asia-Taiwan 2020 under the banner of its International Intelligent Biotech and Medical Alliance with 16 teams presenting their research achievements. Kuang-Hung Hsu, vice president, CGU and Wen-Piao Lin, director of Office of Technology Development and Industry Liaison, CGU will join the CGU teams at the event. Aside from the platform technology for detecting antiviral efficacy developed by Shih's team, Chang Gung Hospital will host three exhibits alongside four showcases co-presented with CGU-incubated firms: an indoor space sterilization and disinfection system with Bio-cando, a YSTC precision high voltage DC power supply with You-Shang, a hypochlorous acid generator with Abes and a fecal occult blood test kit with Sigknow Biomedical. Visitors will see actual products on display and have a chance to communicate with the CGU teams to explore potential partnership opportunities.Field of application has always been the key factor driving rapid commercialization of industry-academia collaboration results. According to NCKU, thanks to MOST's GLORIA project, technology transfer from academic research to commercialization has growth 50% in dollar amount over a three-year period. With Taiwan making outstanding progress in COVID-19 control and prevention, the two universities are committed to continuing their efforts toward developing innovative biomedical technologies, with an aim to help the Taiwan biotech sector expand internationally.CGU's platform for detecting antiviral efficacyPhto: CGUNightingaleAI with a focus on CareAI servicesPhoto: Company