HKBU undergraduate students win two awards at international competition under the supervision of Prof. Zhang Ge
A team of five HKBU students, named “HK-BUddy”, scored impressive successes in the 2016 International Bio-molecular Design Competition held in the US. The team won two awards: the Gold Project Award and 2nd Place in the Project Video competition for their innovative research proposal for Chinese medicines. They beat 30 teams comprising 200 students from more than 10 countries, and their success was the best result achieved by an HKBU team in this competition.
The HKBU team comprised Liu Shihan (Computer Science, Year 4) and four Year 5 students majoring in Chinese Medicine and Biomedical Science: Xu Xinzhou, Zhang Yilin, Yu Jucheng and Wong Lok-tong. Entitled “A smart anti-tumour, nucleolin aptamer-paclitaxel conjugate”, the award-winning proposal demonstrated that the synthesis of nucleolin aptamer-paclitaxel conjugate (NucA-PTX) can break down the limits imposed by paclitaxel alone by effectively enhancing its water-solubility and tumor-targeting capacity. Important features of NucA-PTX are its high stability, low antigenicity and high capacity for cell penetration. It is also easy to modify and synthesise. As a result, the synthesis of NucA-PTX will strikingly improve the tumour selectivity of paclitaxel as a widely-used and effective anti-cancer agent.
Under the supervision of Prof. Zhang Ge and Dr Li Fangfei, the team devoted huge efforts over more than half a year to prepare for the competition. What particularly impressed the judges were the team’s innovative initiatives, confidence and optimistic spirit.
An introduction to the project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdIYUH_lRSk
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