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Month: July 2022

HKBU biologists discover three new coral species in Hong Kong waters

Posted on by HKBUCPRO

Biologists from Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) have discovered in Hong Kong waters three new species of hard coral which have never been identified anywhere else in the world. The findings come shortly after their discovery of one new coral and two new nudibranch species, which was announced last year under their research project on coral health in Hong Kong.

The new marine species were identified by Professor Qiu Jianwen and MPhil student Mr Yiu King-fung of HKBU’s Department of Biology. The descriptions of the new corals have been accepted for publication in the academic journal Zoological Studies.

New species found during coral health research

About eight years ago, Professor Qiu and his team started a series of research projects related to coral health in Hong Kong, including studies on the impact of coral bioeroding sea urchins and coral-eating nudibranchs, as well as coral bleaching caused by global warming. A coral facility was set up at HKBU to culture corals and conduct controlled experiments to examine their physiological changes under different culture conditions. With continuous field surveys and in-depth research, the team has revealed the high diversity of sun corals in Hong Kong waters.

The three new sun coral species discovered this time were named by the HKBU team as Tubastraea dendroida, Tubastraea chloromura and Tubastraea violacea, and they all belong to the genus Tubastraea. The samples were collected when the team surveyed coral-eating nudibranchs at Sung Kong and Waglan Island in the eastern waters of Hong Kong. With the addition of three new members, the number of known species in the Tubastraea genus has increased from seven to ten.

The features of the three new sun coral species are as follows:

Tubastraea dendroida

Similar to most sun corals, Tubastraea dendroida has a typical bright orange colour, but its shape is rather unique. Instead of growing in clumps like most of its related species, this new species has a tree-like structure, with the main stem of its colony attenuating from the base to the tip. The HKBU team therefore named it “dendroida” to reflect its tree-shaped body.

Tubastraea violacea

Covered with a thin layer of pale purple tissue on the corallites (skeletal cups), Tubastraea violacea stands out from other related sun coral species as its polyp wall tissues and skeleton are violet in colour, and it has been named “violacea” accordingly. Nevertheless, its tentacles are yellow and the corallites have a thick wall. Based on comparisons with DNA sequences in public databases, the team found that this species may have colour variants elsewhere, such as a yellow colour variant in New Caledonia in the South Pacific.

Tubastraea chloromura

This coral has a delicate olive green skeletal wall and a circle of yellow tentacles surrounding its mouth. As a result, the species has been named “chloromura”, with “chloro” and “murus” meaning “green” and “wall”, respectively.

From coral gene sequences recorded in public databases, HKBU biologists envisage the potential distribution of Tubastraea dendroida and Tubastraea violacea in Japan and the Western Pacific Ocean. However, at this stage, Tubastraea chloromura is only known to inhabit Hong Kong waters.

All of these three coral species are non-reef-building corals. They do not host symbiotic algae that produce nutrients and energy via photosynthesis. Living in deeper waters at depths of between 10 and 30 metres, they gain energy and nutrients by capturing zooplankton from seawater using their tentacles.

New species discoveries suggest rich biodiversity

“Our discovery of three new species of Tubastraea enhances our knowledge of the diversity of this sun coral genus. Given that corals are one of the best-studied marine animals, our study reveals how little we know about marine diversity, and how many undescribed species are still awaiting our discovery,” said Professor Qiu.

Identification of the three new coral species comes less than a year after Professor Qiu and his team announced their last discovery in October 2021. While implementing a project supported by the Environment and Conservation Fund to assess the diversity and impact of coral-eating nudibranchs, the team discovered a new sun coral species in the genus Tubastraea and two new species of nudibranchs in the genus Phestilla in Hong Kong waters.

Looking back, the last time a new hard coral species was discovered and named in Hong Kong was about 20 years ago. “The discovery is very encouraging as it provides strong evidence of the high marine biodiversity in Hong Kong waters, and it helps fill in the knowledge gaps in biodiversity as advocated in the Government’s Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan. It also inspires us to further explore the diversity of marine animals, study their functions and ecosystem services, and protect them from potential human disturbances,” Professor Qiu added.

TMU parasitology researchers engaged in field investigation in Africa amid COVID pandemic

Posted on by Taipei Medical University

Taipei Medical University research team, led by Professor Chia-Kwung Fan of the Department of Molecular Parasitology and Tropical Diseases, visited the Kingdom of Eswatini, a diplomatic ally of Taiwan, between October and December in 2021.
During the visit, the team successfully carried out a parasitic disease investigation and continued to support the bilateral public health cooperation for parasite control and prevention which was initiated 12 years ago.

Professor Chia-Kwung Fan has for many years been a key supporter of public health diplomacy, leading the collaboration with Mbabane Government Hospital , Malaria Center and the Parasite Prevention Center to monitor various parasitic diseases in Eswatini, such as intestinal parasites, malaria and schistosomiasis by disseminating knowledge and skills required for laboratory work and pest control through tailored training programs. The hope is to bring neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) to an end by 2030 (in line with United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals Target 3.3 on communicable diseases) through cross-national collaboration.

The planned collaboration in research was forced to suspend due to COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, which could lead to the lost momentum in in disease prevention and control and the consequent reappearance of chains of infection. Professor Fan therefore led a team of researchers, consisting of post-doctoral researcher, Chia-Mei Chou , doctoral student of the Department of Public Health, Hsiao-Ching Kuo , and doctoral student of the Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences, Yun-Hung Tu , to re-initiate the collaborative research project in Eswatini.

Reflecting on the task, Professor Fan indicated that the project was awash with unknown and possibly severe challenges. In addition to the preparation of protective equipment and vaccines necessary for protection from COVID-19, a large majority of time was spent with the health personnel in Eswatini strategizing the best plan of action to go deep into the community through scenario planning and carrying out itinerary checks for the inspections, blood collection and questionnaires. On top of the monitoring of intestinal parasites, they also targeted provinces with potential pork tapeworm epidemics risks for serum screening.

Yun-Hung Tu found that even with the training and work experience of a professional medical examiner, he finds it challenging working in the field while wearing full PPE and shuttling between local communities to recover blood, urine and feces samples. Meanwhile, Hsiao-Ching Kuo encountered problems during her research when the off-road bus she took broke down and there was power outage in the accommodation area followed by bad weather. The outbreak of the South African variant of Omicron further complicated matters and resulted in the cancellation of the return flight. While in the field members of the TMU research team faced numerous situations that tested their adaptability and communication skills.

Despite a series of challenges, Professor Fan and his team successfully completed the investigation and produced a solid analysis with recommendations for the local authorities and communities to plan for follow-up treatment. Professor Fan believes that long-term bilateral medical and public health collaboration projects serve to benefit a new generation of medical talent in the fields of biomedical research and international collaboration. Taiwan is uniquely placed to offer its strong clinical capabilities in medical and parasite control and public health to contribute to the wellbeing of international communities. Professor Fan hopes that TMU and the Taiwanese government will continue to pay attention to the development of related fields in medicine and continue to support such partnerships between Taiwan and its international friends.

Programmed cell death in cancer cells: Overcoming resistance through paraptosis-inducing compounds

Posted on by Tokyo University of Science

Researchers from Japan have developed novel complex-peptide hybrids, which can induce programmed cell death in apoptosis-resistant cancer cells

Inducing programmed cell death (PCD), such as apoptosis, is a widely used therapeutic option for the treatment of cancer. Unfortunately, many cancer cells become resistant to PCDs, and continue multiplying. In a new study, researchers from Tokyo University of Science synthesized new complex-hybrid compounds named triptycene-peptide hybrids (TPHs), which successfully induced a kind of PCD known as paraptosis in Jurkat cells—a type of lymphocytes. These paraptosis-inducing compounds can revolutionize cancer therapy in the future.

Apoptosis, a type of programmed cell death (PCD), is a biological process through which unwanted cells are eliminated in multicellular organisms. In most cells, certain proteins known as “caspases” trigger apoptosis. This process is especially important for the treatment of cancer, since inducing cell death in cancer cells can help in their elimination.

Other than apoptosis, several types of PCDs occur in cells, including paraptosis, necroptosis, and autophagy. Of these, paraptosis is the most recently identified type of PCD, which is caused by the influx of excess calcium in the cells, leading to cell death.

Cancer cells often become resistant to drugs that induce apoptosis and other types of PCDs. In such cases, inducing paraptosis, which is not dependent on caspases, could act as a promising anti-cancer treatment. Hence, the development of compounds that can induce paraptosis in cancer cells is crucial.

To this end, a team of researchers from the Tokyo University of Science, led by Prof. Shin Aoki in collaboration with Mr. Kohei Yamaguchi and Dr. Kenta Yokoi, conducted a study to develop novel complex-peptide hybrids with paraptosis-inducing potential. This study was made available online on 11 April 2022, and subsequently published in Volume 33 of the journal Bioconjugate Chemistry, on 20 April 2022.

“Previously, we synthesized an iridium complex-peptide hybrid compound and observed that it induced cell death in cancer cells, which was different from apoptosis. Since this compound was unlike other paraptosis-inducing compounds, we wanted to understand its mechanism of paraptosis induction. Our goal now is to synthesize new compounds and elucidate how they induce paraptosis in cells, before we share this crucial information with the public,” explains Prof. Aoki while discussing the team’s motivation behind this study.

The newly synthesized compounds were composed of a triptycene core—an aromatic hydrocarbon—with two or three cationic peptides made of the amino acids lysine and glycine (represented as KKKGG) through a C8 alkyl linker chain, at different positions of the triptycene units. As a result, three triptycene core hybrids (TPHs) were produced, namely, 5, syn-6, and anti-6.

The team subsequently performed experiments on Jurkat cells, a type of immortalized human lymphocytes used in research, to understand the type of PCD that occurred in these cells on treatment with syn-6 and anti-6. They found that death in these cells was inhibited by carbonyl cyanide m-chlorophenyl hydrazone (CCCP) which is an uncoupling reagent and an inhibitor of mitochondrial calcium uptake, RuRed, which is an inhibitor of the mitochondrial calcium channel), and 2-aminoethoxydiphenyl borate (2-APB), which is an inhibitor of D-inositol-1,4,5-trisphosphate receptor. However, cell death was not inhibited by inhibitors of the other types of PCDs.

Hence, they ruled out autophagy, necroptosis, and apoptosis, confirming that paraptosis is a major PCD pathway induced by syn-6 and anti-6 in Jurkat cells.

“Studies have indicated that the TPHs syn-6 and anti-6 induce the transfer of excess calcium from the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) to mitochondria, resulting in a loss of mitochondrial membrane potential. It is very likely that these phenomena are strongly related with the fusion of the ER with the mitochondria, followed by cytoplasmic vacuolization, resulting in cell death,” said Prof. Aoki, when asked why these two TPHs were selected for the study. The TPHs syn-6, and anti-6 are more hydrophilic than other TPHs, which could also be a reason for their high paraptosis-inducing anti-cancer potential.

Through additional imaging experiments, the team detected the presence of cytoplasmic vacuolization, elevated mitochondrial calcium concentrations, and the degradation of the ER in Jurkat cells treated with syn-6 and anti-6.
Based on previous findings, the team hypothesized that in Jurkat cells as well, the influx of calcium in the mitochondria might be facilitated by the close proximity of the ER and the mitochondria. As expected, they found that the ER and mitochondrial membranes were attached to one another, facilitating direct transfer of calcium.

These findings confirmed that Jurkat cells treated with syn-6 and anti-6 had undergone programmed cell death, owing to paraptosis. They also provide crucial information for the design of compounds that can be used as therapeutic agents against cancer and other diseases.

Here’s hoping that these promising findings contribute to the development of effective therapy against the ever-evolving cancer cells.

***

Reference

Title of original paper: Design, Synthesis, and Anticancer Activity of Triptycene–Peptide Hybrids that Induce Paraptotic Cell Death in Cancer Cells

Journal: Bioconjugate Chemistry

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.bioconjchem.2c00076

About The Tokyo University of Science

Tokyo University of Science (TUS) is a well-known and respected university, and the largest science-specialized private research university in Japan, with four campuses in central Tokyo and its suburbs and in Hokkaido. Established in 1881, the university has continually contributed to Japan’s development in science through inculcating the love for science in researchers, technicians, and educators.

With a mission of “Creating science and technology for the harmonious development of nature, human beings, and society”, TUS has undertaken a wide range of research from basic to applied science. TUS has embraced a multidisciplinary approach to research and undertaken intensive study in some of today’s most vital fields. TUS is a meritocracy where the best in science is recognized and nurtured. It is the only private university in Japan that has produced a Nobel Prize winner and the only private university in Asia to produce Nobel Prize winners within the natural sciences field.

Website: https://www.tus.ac.jp/en/mediarelations/

About Professor Shin Aoki from Tokyo University of Science

Professor Shin Aoki is a professor of cancer biology & research at the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Tokyo University of Science. He is engaged in the study of medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, bioinorganic chemistry, and supramolecular chemistry. He is a recipient of the Award of Japan Society of Coordination Chemistry for Young Scientists (1999); the AJINOMOTO Award in Synthetic Organic Chemistry, Japan (2001); and the Pharmaceutical Society of Japan Award for Young Scientists (2002). He is a graduate from the University of Tokyo with B. S. (1986), M.S. (1988), and Ph.D. (1992) degrees in pharmaceutical sciences. He holds a post doctorate degree from the Department of Chemistry, the Scripps Research Institute, USA.

Erasing cheating online

Posted on by Gitanjali Goswami

The pandemic helped usher in a new normal for online education, but the opportunities also bring challenges around exam integrity. Gitanjali Goswami tracks the trend of academic cheating cases in recent years, and analyses how universities are exploring and improving methods to assess students’ calibre.

“Typically, in a face-to-face exam room… students will be sat at desks spaced around the room,” explains Dr Thomas Lancaster, a Senior Teaching Fellow in Computing at Imperial College London in the UK. “They can’t obviously see each other, they will have to hand over their mobile phones, or put them in their bags out of reach at the start of an exam, and there will be someone in the room, an invigilator or a proctor, to make sure that they are not looking at their notes.

Around a year into COVID-19, many higher education leaders and supporters of digital and online education identified the pandemic as a watershed moment for shifting university thinking on how students are taught. In December 2020, Professor David Maguire, Interim Principal and Vice-Chancellor at the University of Dundee in the UK, noted that resistance towards online education had all but disappeared in the university space.

“What’s happened in the last eight months as a consequence of the pandemic has really had a major impact on universities, and it’s made this change [to bolster online and digital teaching], I think, much more urgent,” he said during the 2020 Reimagine Education Conference and Awards. His observations had already bore out a month earlier in startling fashion, with the Learning and teaching reimagined report, co-authored by Universities UK, Advance HE, Emerge, and Jisc, the latter of which he serves as chair.

According to the report, where there had been reluctance to adopt online prior to the pandemic, there was now an acceptance of its need. Of the students, lecturers, and leaders surveyed, 90 percent agreed that lectures would go online, compared to 10 percent in previous years. When speaking to leaders, Professor Maguire added, few believed the changes would be rolled back.

Looking at recent trends

Concerns around academic integrity aren’t new. The 2009 paper, Academic dishonesty, ethical norms and learning, co-authored by Gunnel Colnerud and Michael Rosander highlights that when either the students lack clarity of examination rules or rules are insufficiently explained, the occurrence of dishonest behaviour rises. Other reasons include stress and the fear of losing grades.

The pandemic created a perfect storm to exacerbate the negative side of these factors. It is the proctor’s role to provide clarity for students, but as Dr Lancaster notes, many exams went without. Rotem Arie, a teacher assistant at Brandeis University in the US, argues in her 2021 paper, Academic Dishonesty and COVID-19: A Biological Explanation, that stress was aggravated during the pandemic. Combined, this led to a global spike in academic cheating cases.

According to online examination integrity platform, ProctorU, there was a drastic rise in the rate of proctors addressing the presence of unpermitted resources before exams commenced. The 2021 Exam Conduct and Integrity Report found a more than eight percentage point increase. During the same period, the proportion of active interventions by proctors on test-takers skyrocketed. In a single month comparison, ProctorU observed three times the ‘confirmed breaches’ in November 2021 compared to November 2019, jumping from 8,038 cases to 26,543.

While the stressors of COVID-19 may have exacerbated issues around exam integrity, some experts observe that these occurrences also a symptom of rapid change. Dr Valerie Denny is Vice-President of the International Center for Academic Integrity (ICAI) and Assistant Professor of Decision Sciences in the College of Business at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University Worldwide in the United States.

“While research is still underway, it is safe to say that cheating for permanent online instruction changed little, while temporary online instruction increased, and some would say dramatically,” she says. “Often courses were converted to the online modality within a few days or weeks and without the benefit of instructional design best practices, and without the benefit of remote monitoring tools. Instructional designers and instructors did the best they could with this forced change.”

Finding effective solutions

Addressing the integrity concerns that online exams present has led to some radical solutions. “In offline classes there is an absolute guarantee that there is no cheating at all because there are supervised examinations,” says Professor Shalabh, Professor and Dean of Academic Affairs at the Indian Institute of Technology- Kanpur.

“In the online classes… it is nearly impossible to say what was happening because nothing was happening before of our eyes.”

Professor Shalabh tells the Higher Ed Report that as a teacher, he needs to keep in mind that “students are human beings, and when they are given an opportunity [to cheat], they have an internal fight inside them of what is right and what is wrong”. His team’s approach was to remove any incentive students would have from cheating. Instead of grading students on whether or not their response to a question was correct, students were instead evaluated on how they answered an exam question.

“I said [to my students] … ‘if you have attempted [a question], even if the answer is wrong, then also you will get the full marks’,” he says. “Now I have removed the advantage of giving the right answer. That means [from student’s perspective] … then why should they use unfair means?”

To swiftly adapt to the transition, services such as CodeTantra and ProctorU were also used to facilitate proctoring online examinations. Services such as these require students to keep their cameras on. ”

If they move quite frequently and abnormally then the software will freeze

, and the students will not be able to appear in the examinations” Shalabh tells the Higher Ed Report.

Addressing new challenges

Online proctoring services eased the process of adapting to complete online examinations, but Dr Lancaster says no system is completely fool proof. “There are ways around them and it is also possible to accuse students of cheating just because they happen to, for example, move their mouth while working on their exam paper while thinking aloud. This happens in a real exam situation as well,” he says. “You’ve got to follow-up with certain things.”

Students have also expressed their displeasure with online proctoring tools because of privacy concerns. Some students don’t want to be seen in their home environment, particularly if their primary area of study happens to be their bedroom. “All these concerns are quite rightly being raised by students, and student bodies. And I think that the sector has to consider this.”

The resumption of in-person examinations at universities might also present its own challenges. Dr Lancaster says he is concerned that students may be unprepared for the exam hall. “There is the expectation that students who haven’t taken an exam in-person for up to two years are ready and able to go back into an exam hall and they know the best ways to learn, and the best exam techniques. That’s quite strange.”

Such transitions have opened a gateway for further research to demonstrate “the efficacy of permanent online learning and… the importance of proper course design [for] different modalities,” says Dr Denny.

“As we move forward and further away from the pandemic, my hope is that some of the lessons from permanent online can be integrated back into the classroom environment, particularly with respect to course design which focuses on misconduct and cheating prevention.”

This article was abridged from 2023 QS World University Rankings Higher Ed Report. Download the full edition.

1st anniversary of largest university-based innopreneurship programme in Asia — HK Tech 300 spawns over 300 start-ups

Posted on by Editorial Team

Fledgling entrepreneurs are eager to start their own ventures and break new ground as innovation and start-ups begin to show promise. To nurture tech talent and entrepreneurs, City University of Hong Kong (CityU) launched HK Tech 300, a large-scale flagship innovation and entrepreneurship programme in March 2021 with an allocation of HK$500 million. Themed “Venture Beyond Boundaries”, the programme helps students, alumni, researchers and other members of the public to kick-start their entrepreneurial journey. This substantial funding and long-term commitment make HK Tech 300 the largest university-based entrepreneurship programme in Asia. In the first year of operation, the programme offered more than 1,000 participants entrepreneurial training, gave seed funding to over 300 teams, and provided nearly 50 start-ups with up to HK$1 million each in angel funding.

Specially designed flexible 4-stage programme

HK Tech 300 has created a 4-stage stage approach to creating 300 start-ups in three years: entrepreneurial training offered by professional organisations, seed funding for early-stage idea validation, angel fund investment to help start-ups grow, and venture capital investment to nurture nascent enterprises until take off. This flexible programme allows applicants to join any of the first three stages based on their specific capabilities and needs.

The programme has so far awarded 302 start-up teams a seed fund of HK$100,000 each, and another 49 start-up companies angel fund investment of up to HK$1 million each. These start-ups specialise in multiple domains, ranging from deep tech, information and communications technology, artificial intelligence (AI), and biotech and health technology to fintech and environmental and educational technology.

CityU is one of the world’s fastest rising universities, ranking 1st in Hong Kong for Citations per Faculty in the QS World University Rankings averaged over five years from 2017 to 2021. According to a Stanford University study, over 170 CityU faculty members were among the top 2% of the world’s most cited scientists in 2021. In addition, CityU was named one of the Top 100 worldwide universities for approved U.S. Patents by the National Academy of Inventors (NAI), having been granted the most U.S. utility patents among universities in Hong Kong for five consecutive years.

“Thanks to our pioneering science and technology research, CityU has won numerous prestigious international awards and made invaluable contributions to the betterment of society. We remain committed to bringing about positive change to industries and the community at large through the transfer of knowledge,” said President Way Kuo of CityU. Another key feature of HK Tech 300 is openness as the programme is not limited to CityU students and alumni. The general public is welcome to use CityU’s patented technologies to develop tech products and services, thereby accelerating technology and knowledge transfer. President Kuo said he is proud of the teams and start-ups spawned by HK Tech 300, noting that they are committed to transforming advanced technologis developed by CityU into applications that bring about real-world benefits.

Translating excellent research into practical applications

HK Tech 300 offers career alternatives and opportunities by helping Hong Kong scientists and researchers to create start-ups. As of April this year, over 20% of the teams and companies awarded seed funding and angel fund investment were established by CityU PhD students and researchers, and 10% of awardees were members of the public.

Thanks to the substantial funding allocated to HK Tech 300, the number of start-ups with diversified backgrounds and specialities is gradually increasing, and several have attracted interest and investment from venture capital funds. These encouraging results confirm the value of CityU’s unwavering commitment to fostering a vibrant innovation and technology ecosystem in Hong Kong.

More details can be referred to https://bit.ly/3Roi3yQ.

ITS chosen as implementing partner for WiSCi Camp: Southeast Asia 2022

Posted on by ITS Global Engagement

Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember (ITS) was chosen to be an implementing partner for ten (10) female senior high school students of the residential-based Science Camp (WiSci): Southeast Asia, a Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics (STEAM) Camp for teen girls allowing access to education, mentorship, and leadership training. The virtual camp is taking place from July 4 to 9, 2022.

WiSci Camps is a public–private partnership by the US Department of State, the United Nations Foundation’s campaign Girl Up, and Intel. Since 2015, camps have been hosted in Africa, Europe, the Caucasus, the Balkans, and the Middle East. WiSci Southeast Asia will be the very first hybrid camp experience. This year, ITS American Corner becomes the home of ten (10) campers and two (2) counselors from the Surabaya area.

Seventy (70) campers and thirteen (13) counselors from Indonesia, the Philippines, and Malaysia participate in WiSci Camp 2022. During the camp, campers will learn leadership skills with their counselors, learn about STEAM topics via sessions with private-sector partners, and conduct a project preparation in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) and SDGs with their cohorts. Campers will also become acquainted with prominent female scientists though a women’s panel discussion, including with representatives from the US embassies in Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines, and Intel trainers.

KNU establishes semiconductor graduate school system to train over 400 experts annually

Posted on by Kyungpook National University ‏‏‎ ‎

Kyungpook National University will establish a ‘semiconductor graduate school system’ that will produce more than 400 semiconductor experts per year. The announcement reflects the active steps KNU is taking to overcome the chronic shortage of semiconductor-related manpower that has recently become serious.

KNU plans to train a total of 100 professionals per year, 50 semiconductor experts through an undergraduate master’s linkage course, and 50 advanced semiconductor experts through a master’s-doctoral linkage course. In addition, through the ‘Interdisciplinary Convergence Graduate Program,’ which integrates related fields in the semiconductor industry ecosystem, such as materials, process, design, and system semiconductors, 300 skilled professionals will be trained annually.

Kyungpook National University has been developing the field of IT as a national specialized field since the 1970s, while also steadily building research infrastructure for training talented professionals. Moreover, KNU is currently moving forward with a next-generation semiconductor ecosystem creation project with Daegu Metropolitan City, and it is also planning the establishment of an academic department that is customized/employment-guaranteed through collaboration with various industries.

Won-Hwa Hong, President of Kyungpook National University, noted, “The talented semiconductor experts that are produced will create a virtuous cycle ecosystem of core technology, R&D, and professionally competent industrial manpower, which will be a powerful driving force for regional development and for gaining a competitive edge in the international semiconductor rivalry, which is often described as a ‘world war.’”

HKAPA, Swire launch Greater Bay Area youth orchestra

Posted on by Communications Office

The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts (HKAPA) proudly celebrated the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the HKSAR at the HKSAR 25th Anniversary Celebration Concert with the generous support from the Swire Group. The Academy, in partnership with the Swire Group, also announced the founding of the Greater Bay Area Youth Orchestra – a pioneering youth initiative to foster cultural exchange across the region.

Established and directed by HKAPA, with the support of the Swire Group as Founding Patron, the Greater Bay Area Youth Orchestra aspires to be one of the finest youth orchestras in Asia. It will aim to raise the standard of classical performances in the Greater Bay Area (GBA) to new heights, by bringing together talented young musicians from across the region for professional training under the auspices of HKAPA, as well as offering opportunities for performance and cultural exchange. Commencing this autumn, 2022, the Greater Bay Area Youth Orchestra will begin to enrol its first intake of around 80-100 young musicians aged between 16 and 24 years from Hong Kong, Guangzhou and Macau.

“As an internationally recognised conservatoire, HKAPA is committed to promoting Hong Kong as a global centre of excellence for the arts and cultural exchange,” said HKAPA Director, Professor Gillian Choa. “It therefore gives me great pleasure, in partnership with Swire Group, to announce the formation of the Greater Bay Area Youth Orchestra – a unique opportunity to nurture talented young musicians from cities around the GBA, enabling them to develop to their fullest potential. I would like to take this opportunity to express my sincere gratitude to the HKSAR Government for its commitment to the arts and unfaltering support for HKAPA over the years. My thanks also go to the Swire Group for their sponsorship of tonight’s very special concert, combining the talents of various music institutes around the GBA in celebration of the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the HKSAR.”

“Swire is delighted to be Founding Patron of the Greater Bay Area Youth Orchestra,” said Guy Bradley, Chairman of John Swire & Sons (H.K.) Limited. “We are very excited by the potential offered by this new initiative to promote Hong Kong as Asia’s city of culture and creativity and we hope that through music, we can encourage the development of closer connections between young people from all parts of the Greater Bay Area.”

“The Greater Bay Area Youth Orchestra will provide a platform for talented young orchestral players from our neighbouring cities to share their passion for music,” said Professor Sharon Andrea Choa, HKAPA’s Head of Conducting and Cultural Leadership (Music). “Our aim is to enrich the artistic visions of our younger generation, enabling them to see their future beyond geographic or cultural boundaries.”

“The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts Presents: HKSAR 25th Anniversary Celebration Concert” programme included three contrasting works performed by the Academy Symphony Orchestra: Dai Pai Dong, an award-winning work inspired by the unique Hong Kong culinary culture; guzheng concerto Rushi; and Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy in C minor, Op.80, with the Academy Choir. Xinghai Conservatory of Music, the Macao Youth Symphony Orchestra Association and the Shenzhen Arts School also provided special video performances for tonight’s programme. Guest conductors included Maestros, Lio Kuokman and Lin Daye.

To celebrate the HKSAR’s 25th anniversary, some tickets for the concert were distributed free to members of the public and the concert was also livestreamed on the HKAPA website and on RTHK TV32 for audiences in Hong Kong and the Chinese Mainland to enjoy the performances of talented musicians from the region. A video of the occasion will also be made available online; please stay tuned to the Academy website and social media channels for updates.

Malaysia, Japan collaborate in mangrove forest conservation and sustainable management

Posted on by Darren Yoong

Three Malaysian organisations including the Sarawak Forest Corporation, Sunway University, and the University of Technology Sarawak have entered into a public-private collaboration with two of Japan’s leading technology companies, Aerosense Inc. and Funlead Corp to improve the mangrove forests in Sarawak through the adoption of drone technology and artificial intelligence.

The research project funded by both Sunway University and the Asia-Pacific Telecommunity (APT) is necessary to procure evidence-based, systematic mangrove conservatory strategies to promote long-term ecological and economical resilience in Sarawak’s Mangrove forests.

Malaysia is one of the largest mangrove-holding countries in the World, with Sarawak having the second-largest coverage in Malaysia. The mangrove forests have been playing an important ecological, social, and economic role in the ecosystem. However, these covers have inevitably been subjected to threats such as climate change, various land use, and human activities.

Through this project, the team will be able to obtain real-time plant health monitoring, as well as proactively protect the mangrove forest through artisanal fisheries surveillance. This research project is led by Prof. Yap Kian Meng, who is also the Head of Sunway University’s Research Centre for Human-Machine Collaboration (HUMAC), School of Engineering and Technology.

“As one of the collaborative partners, Sarawak Forest Corporation is always in pursuit of useful and innovative technology that helps save the environment. This collaboration between all the parties will help conservation as the focused work targets our concerns of healthy forests and degraded lands that we need to rewild,” said Zolkipli Mohamad Aton, Chief Executive Officer of Sarawak Forest Corporation.

Meanwhile, Prof. Mahendhiran Nair, Pro-Vice Chancellor, Research Engagement and Impact of Sunway University said, “This initiative is aligned with the vision for Malaysia as outlined in the 12 Malaysian Plan to protect the country’s natural habitat and create a better return of value from the biodiversity and conservation efforts. Protecting the mangrove using advanced technology will have several economic, social, and environmental spill overs to Malaysia and the regional economies”.

The two Japanese companies – Aerosence Inc., provides drone technology and cloud SaaS (Software as a Service) solution, while Funlead Corp., an ICT company provides support for data acquisition and image analysis with artificial intelligence technologies. Aerosense and Funlead are both the alumni of 2021 JETRO-Sunway Innovation Labs (iLabs) Digital Transformation Accelerator that aims to support the Japanese companies to better position themselves and expand across Malaysia, using the Sunway ecosystem as a launchpad and testbed.

According to Satoru Shimada, Board of Directors of Aerosense, the research will be further complemented with vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) technology that will cover up to about 300ha per flight for drone photogrammetry. This will enhance the mangrove monitoring efficiency. Meanwhile, Koichi Kishi, the Senior Manager of Funlead Corp. envisages the deployment of a compact, light-weight hyperspectral sensor in the next phase to improve analytical abilities. This enhancement is supposed to enable the grasping distribution of Mangrove species precisely.

“JETRO works together with the Japanese government to promote open innovation by supporting the collaboration between ASEAN organizations and Japanese companies. Environmental conservation is one of the synergistic areas between Malaysia and Japan and this collaboration uses the advantages and ability of both countries in building meaningful solutions around the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals; an excellent example of Malaysia-Japan business collaborations in keeping the environmental ecosystem”, commented Yuhei Enguchi, the Digital Transformation Director of JETRO Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The best young scientist of Eurasia

Posted on by Al- Farabi Kazakh National University

Doszhanov Yerlan Ospanovich is a highly qualified specialist in the field of petrochemistry, microbiology and ecology. The main area of his scientific research concerns the environmental problems of the Republic of Kazakhstan related to the processes of purification of oil-contaminated soils, oxidation of hydrocarbons and oil refining after bioremediation and phytoremediation. The problem of environmental protection and purification from oil and petroleum products pollution is becoming increasingly acute due to the limited possibilities (and sometimes environmental harm) of using biotechnological and physico-chemical purification methods for these purposes. This area of research is particularly relevant for Kazakhstan, where soil and water bodies are polluted during oil extraction, transportation, processing and storage. Meanwhile, many aspects of the impact of hydrocarbon pollution on the environment and humans have been little studied.

For the first time , together with the laboratory staff under the guidance of Prof. Z.A. Mansurova proposed a method for investigating the regularities of the process of biooxidation of oil and petroleum products in soils depending on the process parameters and physico-chemical characteristics of hydrocarbons.

The proposed unique biochemical method for identifying sources of hydrocarbon pollution and assessing the degradation of oil and petroleum products in soil systems has been used in the implementation of scientific projects and published in a number of internationally cited journals.

The patterns and information obtained as a result of the performed studies on the utilization of hydrocarbon raw materials in the technogenesis zone are of great practical importance in petrochemistry and ecology for taking effective measures to reduce the impact of oil and petroleum products on the local population and predicting the biochemical and physico-chemical behavior of hydrocarbons in oil production sites, during its transportation, processing and storage. The obtained scientific results, as well as biochemical methods of analysis developed during the implementation of scientific projects, are widely used in the educational process in the courses “Petrochemistry”, “Oil and Gas business” (section “Ecology of the oil and gas complex”), including in the discipline taught in English (“Petrochemisty”).

He participated in conducting research work on oil fields and granary oil fields, conducted as part of scientific projects for conducting model and field experiments on cleaning soils with free cells of hydrocarbon-oxidizing microorganisms and oil-resistant plants.

In accordance with the program of scientific activity for the period of receiving the award, E.O. Doszhanov was engaged in the development of scientific foundations for the creation of a new technology for remediation of soils contaminated with organic hydrocarbons, taking into account the peculiarities of biotic and climatic conditions of the regions of Kazakhstan.

The development and implementation of highly effective biotechnologies based on the use of microorganisms-destructors of hydrocarbons, plants-accumulators for the protection and protection of the environment in oil-polluted soils of the regions of Kazakhstan are relevant. In order to develop a high technological level that ensures the formation of a biotechnological cluster, it is necessary to provide scientific and technical support for the development of biotechnology in the republic for the purification of soils from oil and petroleum products.

The expected scientific results will have important theoretical and applied significance in petrochemistry, biotechnology and ecology, which is associated with ensuring the safety of the population and preventing hydrocarbon pollution of the territory of Kazakhstan.