M.U.S.T. President Joseph Hun-wei Lee and Vice President Paul Kwong Hang Tam led a delegation to visit Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University
During May 29 and 30, 2024, President Chair Professor Joseph Hun-wei Lee and Vice-President Chair Professor Tam Kwong Hang of Macau University of Science and Technology led a delegation of M.U.S.T. professors to visit Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Harvard University and Boston Children’s Hospital (BCH). The delegation visited state of the art facilities in engineering and biomedical research, and learned about the latest developments in inter-disciplinary research and education, innovation and entrepreneurship.
On May 30, 2024, President Lee met with MIT Chancellor for Academic Advancement Prof. Eric Grimson and held exchanges on latest developments in Macao and explored possible areas of collaboration in research and education between MIT and the Hong Kong – Macao region. Useful exchanges on engineering education were also held between Faculty of Innovation Engineering colleagues and Professor Dick K.P. Yue of Ocean Engineering, a member of US National Academy of engineering and key originator of the MIT Open Courseware (OCW) Project.
President Chair Prof. Joseph Hun-wei Lee (left) and MIT Chancellor for Academic Advancement Prof. Eric Grimson
Visit to MIT Laboratories
The delegation also visited MIT’s Media Lab, the Sloan Automotive Lab and the Langer Lab. The delegation was shown how AI aims to design the future of smart systems to improve the human experience, how the automotive engines are improved by modeling, analysis, and experiments, how drugs are developed to specifically inhibit the aberrant growth of new blood vessels, which may cause human disease conditions, including cancer, retinopathy, etc., and how bio-nanomaterial based smart drug delivery systems – a marriage of medicine and engineering - may lead to revolutionary treatments for patients.
M.U.S.T. delegation led by VP Chair Prof Paul Tam with Mirei Rioux (front left 2), Director of Member/Donor Relations of the MIT Media Lab.
Principal Research Engineer, Mechanical Engineering, Dr. Tian Tian gave an introduction of the MIT Sloan Automotive Lab to the delegation.
Vice President Chair Prof. Paul Tam and delegation had a tour at the Langer Lab
President Lee and FIE delegation with MIT Open Courseware originator and Ocean Engineering Professor Dick K.P. Yue
Visit to Harvard Business School and School of Engineering and Applied Sciences
A highlight of the visit is to see the Innovation Labs (I-Lab) of the Harvard Business School (Hi) – a recent university wide initiative at Harvard to promote inter-disciplinary education. The keyword that encapsulates the essence of the I-Lab is "barrier-breaking." This initiative aims to remove disciplinary barriers and facilitate connections among Harvard students, alumni, entrepreneurs, investors, and mentors globally. It is noteworthy that the Harvard Innovation Labs has successfully supported 7 unicorn startups, which is incredibly impressive. The School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) also enables collaboration across academic areas with the larger university, and with colleagues in academia, industry, government, and public service organizations beyond Harvard. It was also an eye-opening experience to visit the impressive frontier bio-medical engineering research and educational resources in the new SEAS building.
Executive Director of Harvard Innovation Labs, Matt Segneri gave an introduction of the Harvard Innovation Labs
President Chair Prof. Joseph Hun-wei Lee (5th from the left) with Executive Director of Harvard Innovation Labs, Matt Segneri (5th from the right) and the delegation
Harvard John A. Paulson SEAS Engineering and Applied Sciences Building
Bio-robotics laboratory and workshop at SEAS
Visit to Harvard Medical School
The delegation was received by Dr. Nancy Andrews, a member of the US National Academy of Sciences and the Executive Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer of Boston Children’s Hospital (BCH) - a world leading researcher working on iron homeostasis. BCH ranks the best pediatric medical center and the best children's hospital in the United States of America and Dr. Andrews shared that it is the world's largest and most highly funded pediatric hospital. President Lee then went on to introduce M.U.S.T. and shared the University’s recent achievements. This was followed by a grand tour of the impressive molecular biology lab at BCH’s Karp Family Research Laboratories, where the late Professor Judah Folkman, mentor of Professor Robert Langer, pioneered the molecular basis of angiogenesis and its role in human disease conditions, such as cancer.
President Lee and Vice President Tam with Chief Scientific Officer Dr. Nancy Andrews of Boston Children’s Hospital
An introduction to the working area of the BCH founder Professor Judah Folkman at the Karp Family Research Laboratories.
Vice President Tam and Professor Sookja Chung – Professor of Faculty of Medicine & Associate Program Director of Engineering Foundation Program also met with Dr A. Enrique Caballero, Director, International Innovation Programs, and Mr Eric Vogt, Director of Business Development for Corporate Learning of the Office for External Education at Harvard Medical School. Both sides celebrated M.U.S.T.’s successful implementation of the HMX program in the past 5 years and affirmed the benefit of the high quality education teaching program for M.U.S.T.’s MBBS students as well as the agreement to develop the M.U.S.T.-Harvard Medical /school partnership.
The delegation also included Prof. Li Xiao Dong, Assistant Dean of Faculty of Innovation Engineering & Program Director of School of Computer Science and Engineering; Chair Prof. Wu Naiqi, Head of Department of Engineering Science; Prof. Wang Wenmin, Program Director of School of Computer Science and Engineering; Assistant Prof. Cai Qihai of School of Business; Assistant Prof. Zhang Kai of Department of Environmental Science and Engineering, and Sheryl Lee, Faculty Secretary of Faculty of Innovation Engineering.
