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| 1 | 24, 29, 31 May 2023 | Seminar + workshop
Project Development and Writing of Research Proposal in Medical Science
24, 29, 31 May 2023 UTAR Sungai Long Campus KA block, lecture theater 2 Lecturer: Professor Dr. Choo Kong Bung Senior Professor Date and time: 29 May, 2023 (Monday) (1.30 - 3.30 pm); 24 & 31 July, 2023 (Mondays) (1.00 – 4.00 pm) Topics:Part A. Lecture on “Project Development and Writing of a Research Proposal in Medical Science” Part B. Workshop on “Writing and Publishing Research Papers in Medical Science” Course format: The workshop (Part B) included lectures, assignments, one-to-one discussion and class discussion. Assignment 1: Each workshop participant submitted a short piece of his/her own unedited scientific writing (300-500 words) for editorial comments from Prof. Choo. The writing may be an abstract, a section of Results with figures and/or tables, or a Discussion section based on ongoing studies, or an early draft of a thesis or journal manuscript. The assignment was collected by the class representative and forwarded to Prof. Choo in a batch by 14 July, 2023. After editing the assignments, Prof. Choo returned them to the participants with comments on the strengths and weaknesses of the writing. A One-to-One Discussion Session, of 20 min duration, on each edited assignment was conducted on July 31, 2023 (Monday) at 10 am – 12 noon. Assignment 2: A short list of sentences or short paragraphs with room for improvements were collected anonymously from the Assignment 1 hand-ins and sent to participants as an editing exercise to improve the writing. Editing of Assignment 2 was discussed in the class on 31 July, 2023. Lecture topics and schedule
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| 2 | 6 October 2023 | Sharing session by visiting scholar Dr Zhao Dongmei
Introduction to Binzhou Medical University (BMU) School of Basic Medical Sciences and their key research areas
6 October 2023
UTAR Sungai Long Campus, MK FMHS, postgraduate lab meeting room
Visiting scholar: Associate Professor Dr Zhao Dongmei
Associate Professor Dr Zhao Dongmei from the School of Basic Medical Sciences, Binzhou Medical University (BMU), introduced all CSCR members to her institution. In an effort to forge potential collaborations, she also highlighted ongoing research projects in her institution that were related to stem cells. BMU School of Basic Medical Sciences is situated in Yantai, Shandong Province. The university has 2 administrative offices, 12 teaching and research offices, 1 basic medical experimental teaching center and 6 teaching laboratories. It offers Master's degree in "Basic medical sciences". The Department of Human Anatomy is designated as a provincial key discipline. Currently, there are three main research focuses: (i) utilizing tissue engineering techniques to construct "biomaterial scaffolds + seed cells" for treating spinal cord injuries (ii) tissue-engineered blood vessels for cardiovascular complications and (iii) targeted therapy of stem cells in acute myeloid leukaemia.
 The first research team is led by Professor Zhao Fei. Their research mainly centers around acellular neural scaffolds, temperature-controlled slowly-released gel materials and other synthetic materials for animals such as rats, rabbits, pigs and cattle. Application of acellular matrix as an engineered nerve transplantation carrier with exogenous MSCs as seed cells for repairing spinal cord injury is investigated. They have also identified the pivotal roles of key factors such as NGF, GM1, SRF, Mst3 on neuronal axon growth, mainly via inducing proliferation and differentiation of endogenous neural stem cells. The second research team consists of Associate Professor Dr Zhang Xiaoqing from BMU and Professor Craig Simmons from the University of Toronto, Canada. They have established a method for injecting hiPSC cardiomyocytes into infarcted hearts, carried by micron-scale nanofiber scaffold. The cardiac performance post-injection is evaluated. The third research team is led by Professor Yin Yancun. They have reported that leukaemia stem cells (LSCs) are the major culprits behind the occurrence, progression, drug resistance and relapse of leukaemia. The pluripotency regulatory mechanisms of LSCs is of paramount significance for targeted therapies and clinical treatments of leukaemia. Since cancer cells exert tight control over the metabolism of ceramide and sphingolipids, they are also actively developing novel therapies for leukaemia treatment via targeting ACER3 or SPHK2.
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