(Reprint from xkb.com.cn) Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering and President of Macau University of Science and Technology Chair Professor Liu Liang was invited to pay a visit to and give an academic talk at his alma mater Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine on the morning of December 23, 2019. The president used the two words, “appreciative” and “amazed”, twice when expressing feelings about his homecoming visit to the alma mater, and gave a one-hour academic talk for the university teachers and students, which drew an audience of several hundred teachers and students.
President of Macau University of Science and Technology Academician Liu Liang gave a talk at his alma mater Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine
In 2019, President Liu Liang was elected to be the first academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering in Macao. It’s been many years since he last visited his alma mater, where he received congratulations from Party Secretary Zhang Jianhua, President Wang Shengliang, and other teachers and students of the Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine. President Liu Liang resorted to the two words, “appreciative” and “amazed” to convey his feelings upon this homecoming. He said that he would always be appreciative of the cultivation of the alma mater Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine and his respected supervisor Prof. Wang Jianhua, and he was appreciative of the efforts made by the older-generation of professors in academic and cultural transmissions, such as Prof. Huang Yaoshen, Prof. Deng Tietao, and Prof. Wang Jianhua from the University and its library, he was amazed by the fast development of the talents cultivated, and felt tremendously appreciative to his alma mater for its support to Macau University of Science and Technology in teaching, internship, and research collaborations.
President Liu Liang recalled his time spent at the alma mater. He came to Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine in February of 1978, where he spent 22 unforgettable years. In the wake of the great era of national opening up and reform, he was able to take in a tremendous amount of scientific nutrition here, and eventually became a scholar practicing teaching, education and research. President Liu Liang said that he felt forever grateful to the teachers he had at the alma mater for leading him to the knowledge heaven of Chinese medicine, where he started to develop growing confidence in the field and eventually found his calling, his lifetime goal. The president also noted that the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area has afforded unprecedented opportunities for the development of Chinese medicine, and within its field in the Greater Bay Area, the alma mater would be due expected to play a leading role, and thus he hoped that the two universities could reinforce cooperation in the future, deepening ties in training of talents and scientific research. President Wang Shengliang reciprocated his thanks to President Liu Liang, saying that Macao University of Science and Technology and Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine shared both geological and genealogical advantages. So far, the two universities have collaborated to establish the Chinese Medicine Cancer Prevention Translational Medicine Research Joint Laboratory, and in the future would expect to broaden cooperation in many other fields; it was hoped that President Liu Liang could continue to help prompt the alma mater to develop further in scientific and technological innovations.
President Liu Liang (center), and Party Secretary Zhang Jianhua (4th from left) and President Wang Shengliang (6th from left) of Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine
On the same day, President Liu Liang also gave an academic talk titled “Quality-Based, Innovation-Driven, and Extraordinariness-Aiming Development” at the international conference hall of Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine. This has been President Liu Liang’s second public talk since the one in Macao on December 16, and it assembled an audience of approximately 500 teachers and students. The president introduced the development of Macau University of Science and Technology in terms of its innovative leadership, explorations and practices in building a high-quality, international university, and its innovative integration and application of multiple frontier technologies in solving complex scientific problems in Chinese medicine. He noted that, it now owns a variety of “innovative practices” and “firsts” in the world medicine history, which have been the results of integrating Chinese medicine with contemporary science and technologies. The high, new technologies in modern medicine mostly derive from loaning and drawing from the technological advancements in other fields, so should the Chinese medicine field. What is needed urgently is to construct a new Chinese medicine science and technology innovation system, that integrates and applies the advanced technologies and techniques of many disciplines, including modern medicines, and to reinforce the independent innovation and original innovative research in Chinese medicine so as to accomplish multiple breakthroughs in theories and clinical practices. This not only is what is required for the transmission and innovative development of Chinese medicine, but also fits the developmental patterns as an academic field. When talking about how to integrate modern cross-disciplinary high and new technologies into the field, President Liu Liang emphasized the importance of an open, objective attitude; that is, an attitude that avoids inertia-driven resistance, straight copycatting, and being overly critical, but instead encourages bold exploration, continuous practices and gradual perfection. Looking ahead, we should aim at the prevention of major and critical diseases, adopt high new technologies in quality control and new drugs’ discoveries and manufacturing in Chinese medicine, take advantage of new high technologies to elucidate the medical values and mechanisms of treatment, integrate new technologies from multiple fields and disciplines so as to develop innovative ones and techniques which can help to solve the complex scientific problems of Chinese medicine. Big data, digitalization, and smartization have the prospect to become breaking points for further development.
Party Secretary Zhang Jianhua of Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine spoke to conclude Academician Liu Liang’s talk, saying that the academician, in his talk, has generously imparted valuable experience in educational management over the past decade, and shared his impressive scientific and research achievements, and demonstrated his profound love for family and his patriotism, his passion for Chinese medicine and his gratitude to the alma mater and his teachers, which have depicted his admirable vision as a remarkable scientist and educator. She emphasized that the talk by Academician Liu Liang has enabled the teachers and students in the audience to “learn, think, and be inspired”, and she hoped that the audience could draw inspirations from the talk, seek collaboration and contribute forces to the University in its striving towards becoming a member of the “Double First Class University Plan” and a high-standard university.