PolyU researchers have been engaging in research related to traditional Chinese medicine and health foods, and the findings will be shared at the fourth International Functional Food Symposium entitled “New Horizons in Chinese Medicine and Health Foods”, to be held on 29 and 30 October.

A highlight of the Symposium will be the presentation by Prof. Han Yifan on his research of “Novel Anti-Alzheimer’s Dimers derived from Chinese Medicines”. Prof. Han of the Department of Applied Biology and Chemical Technology is a leading researcher in studying neuroprotective therapeutics for Alzheimer’s disease.

Prof. Han’s research approach is based on the use of acetylcholinesterase (AChE) inhibitors and NMDA-receptor, both of which have showed encouraging clinical results for protecting our neural cells from the disease. More importantly, Prof. Han has discovered a novel Lycopodium alkaloid which can be extracted on mass scale from Chinese medicine Huperzia serrata (千層塔). Several new dimers have been developed in his laboratory and experimental results suggested that these are new treatments for the prevention of Alzheimer’s disease and other related neurodegenerative disorders.

Other highlights include Prof. Halpern’s presentation on “Medicinal Mushrooms”, and Prof. William Chan Tak-hang’s presentation on “Challenge and opportunity of Chinese herbal medicine in cancer”. Details >>