研究資助局「醫療科技與社會」公眾講座 Research Grants Council Public Lectures on “Medical Technology and Society”

研究資助局（研資局）的公眾講座旨在提升市民對本地研究的興趣。研資局將於四月十日（星期六）在香港中央圖書館補辦「醫療科技與社會」公眾講座。該公眾講座原定於去年十二月舉辦。

研資局邀請香港中文大學禤永明系統工程與工程管理學教授蒙美玲和香港大學電機及電子工程系教授謝堅文，與市民分享他們的研究成果及知識。

有興趣人士可透過互聯網，以香港公共圖書館的多媒體資訊系(mmis.hkpl.gov.hk）免費收看講座的現場直播。

人口老齡化是全球關注的問題。世界衛生組織（世衛）表示， 60 歲以上的人口到二○五○年將翻倍至近全球總人口的22％，而香港65 歲以上的人口更將佔本地總人口的35%。 神經認知障礙包括各種類型的腦退化症，在老年人中尤為常見。由於口語屬易於擷取的數據（包括遙距），並可支援敏感的認知評估，蒙教授的團隊正在開發人工智能（AI）驅動的技術，提取口語生物標誌物以及早發現神經認知障礙。她會以「以人工智能促進認知健康」為題，分享如何透過AI醫療保健技術優化神經認知障礙管理，響應世衛將腦退化症提升為國家和國際層面上公共衞生和社會護理的首要關注問題。

激光顯微鏡技術在過去十年間迅速發展, 其應用範圍不僅涵蓋生物化學及細胞／分子生物研究，近年來也成功應用於各項臨床醫學研究以及臨床診斷。 雖然如此，目前的技術仍有很多不足，因此我們對健康與疾病認知仍然相當有限。謝教授將以「快速激光顯微技術 - 為健康及疾病解碼」為題，介紹香港大學最近在生物醫學顯微鏡技術研究上的突破。當中包括擷取活體腦部神經元在毫秒間所產生的電脈衝訊號的高解像度照片；在不破壞細胞及微生物的情況下，以三維影像呈現它們的內部運作，以及從億萬正常血液細胞中，高速及有效地分辨罕見癌細胞。這些技術不但開拓生物科學研究領域（包括神經科學），並為具成本效益的臨床診斷，特別是癌症篩查，創造許多新機會。

The public lectures of the Research Grants Council (RGC) aim at arousing public interest in local research developments. The RGC will present public lectures under the theme “Medical Technology and Society” on April 10 (Saturday) at the Hong Kong Central Library.  The public lectures were originally scheduled in last December.

The RGC has invited Patrick Huen Wing Ming Professor of Systems Engineering & Engineering Management of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, Helen Meng, and Professor of the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering of the University of Hong Kong, Kevin Tsia, to share their research findings and knowledge with the public.

Interested parties can watch the live broadcast of the lectures through the Multimedia Information System of the Hong Kong Public Libraries via the internet (mmis.hkpl.gov.hk) for free.

Population ageing is a global concern. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the number of people aged over 60 will nearly double to make up 22 per cent of the world’s population by 2050, while the number of Hong Kong people aged over 65 will rise to make up 35per cent of the local population. Neurocognitive disorders (NCD), which include various types of dementia – are particularly prominent in elderly people. As spoken language can be easily captured (even remotely) and enables sensitive cognitive assessments, Professor Meng’s team is developing Artificial Intelligence (AI)-driven technologies to automatically extract spoken language biomarkers for early detection of NCD. She will deliver a talk titled “AI for Cognitive Health” to share how AI-enabled healthcare contributes to better NCD management. This aligns with WHO’s plan of making dementia a public health and social care priority at national and international levels.
 

In the past ten years, laser microscopy has successfully made it permeated not only in biochemistry and cell/molecular biology research, but also in numerous preclinical and clinical applications. However, our understanding of health and disease is still very limited. Professor Tsia will introduce the latest breakthrough in laser microscopy technologies developed at the University of Hong Kong in his talk titled “Decoding health and disease with high-speed laser imaging technologies”. These technologies include capturing high-resolution motion pictures of the swift-flying brain signals in a living animal; visualising the inner workings of biological cells and organisms in 3D without killing them; and detecting rare cancer cells among millions of blood cells. Not only can these technologies expand the realm of biological research (e.g. in neuroscience), but they will also create many new opportunities in cost-effective clinical diagnosis, especially cancer screening.