Quality Alchemist (品質煉金術師): HKSTP Inauguration Ceremony of Ming Wai Lau Centre for Reparative Medicine, Karolinska Institutet in Science Park

2016年10月7日星期五

HKSTP Inauguration Ceremony of Ming Wai Lau Centre for Reparative Medicine, Karolinska Institutet in Science Park

With a strong focus on technologies relevant to regenerative medicine (e.g. RNA technology, single-cell analysis and genetic engineering), the Ming Wai Lau Centre for Reparative Medicine (Lau Centre) is being developed in Hong Kong and located at Hong Kong Science Park, so as to provide support and encouragement for increased research and innovation opportunities. Before the ceremony, CE of HKSAR arrived.

In the beginning, Prof. Karin Dahlman-Wright (Acting Vice-Chancellor, Karolinska Institutet) gave welcome remarks. The vision of Lau Centre is to further accelerate research in stem cell biology, biomedical engineering, biotechnology, and regenerative medicine and to create a vivid platform for synergistic collaborations.

Then the Honourable CY Leung (Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region) gave a keynote speech. He said the Lau Centre established in Hong Kong could enhance the development of stem cell and reparative medicine research. Karolinska Institutet is Sweden’s first public university to establish centre abroad and is also a good example for cooperation between Sweden and Hong Kong.

The ribbon-cutting ceremony and group photo

Mr. Ming Wai Lau (Chairman, Chinese Estates Holdings Limited) gave an opening speech.

Ms. Helena Storm (Consul General of Sweden in Hong Kong and Macau) gave introduction speech. She introduced the milestone below:

2010: Theme-based research scheme (TRS) Workshop

2011: HK’s frist TRS-pluripotent stem cell grant amounted to $60million was funded by the Research Grants Council

2012: President Office of KI made an official visit to Hong Kong.

2013: The first co-publication by HK and KI stem cell researchers in Nature Biotechnology was published.

2014: It was a key year with several important events contributing to the inauguration of the Ming Wai Lau Centre for Reparative Medicine in Hong Kong

2015: In February, a 50 million USD donation from Mr. Ming-Wai Lau to the Karolinska Institutet was announced to establish a center in reparative medicine. Location confirmed to be HKSTP.

The last speaker was Prof. Tak Wah Mak) and his topic named “To see things in the seed, that is genius” (Lao Tzu statement). He briefed some science history between West and East. He said Archimedes was considered the First Scientist in the Western World and Zhang Heng (張衡) (AD 78-139) was considered the First Scientist in the Eastern World.

The he introduced the top 3 pearls to scientific & commercial success below.

1. Passion & Perseverance

- Success in research comes with Passion

- Not everything you touch turns into GOLD

- If you do not feel the excitement, do something else!

- “For many are called, but few are chosen” Matthew 22:14 (Passion, Sacrifice & Commitment)

- We have to kiss a lot of frogs to find a prince.

- Sometimes, after a long and hard journey, things can end up in disaster.

2. Creativity & Serendipity

- We assume that technology can replace scientific insights and hypothesis-led progress

- We must not ignore serendipity

- Louis Pasteur “In the fields of observation chance favors only the prepared mind.”

3. Mentorship & Sponsorship

- Nurture the seeds and bushes for they are the flowers and trees for tomorrow.

The interested diagram showed that “Don’t Just follow! Time to look elsewhere!”

After that he introduced the funding and costs for drug discovery programs. He shared the critical success factors for drug discovery that were “Originality”, “Tractability”, “Experience” and “Funding”.