Dedicated to impactful multidisciplinary collaborations, PolyU researchers have received significant funding support of close to HK$137 million from the Research Grants Council (RGC)’s Theme-based Research Scheme (TRS) and Strategic Topics Grant (STG) in 2023/24 to conduct breakthrough research in sustainable development and mental healthcare. The encouraging funding achievement highlights the University’s strategic importance in driving Hong Kong’s long-term development, overcoming imminent challenges and capturing emerging opportunities.

 

PolyU-led projects funded under TRS 2023/24

Outstanding Research Postgraduate Alumni Award

Project coordinator:
Professor Cao Jiannong

  • Otto Poon Charitable Foundation Professor in Data Science

  • Chair Professor of Distributed and Mobile Computing, Department of Computing

  • Dean of Graduate School

  • Director, Research Institute for Artificial Intelligence of Things

  • Director, Internet and Mobile Computing Lab

  • Founding Director and Associate Director, University Research
    Facility in Big Data Analytics

Project:
High-performance Collaborative Edge Computing Enabling Smart City Applications: Framework and Methodologies

 

Summary:
This project aims to build a new smart city computing infrastructure enabled by collaborative edge computing with edge/cloud collaboration, city-scale edge network deployment and built-in artificial intelligence services. The Collaborative Edge Computing Framework (CECF) will construct a future ubiquitous computing infrastructure by connecting, sharing and managing the resources of numerous edge nodes. CECF provides new abstractions and functionalities for geo-distributed edge nodes to share computing and data resources and perform application tasks, enabling advanced smart city applications.

 

Approved Budget*:   

HK$50.821 million

 

PolyU-led projects funded under TRS 2023/24

Ni

Project coordinator:
Professor Ni Yiqing

  • Yim, Mak, Kwok & Chung Professor in Smart Structures

  • Chair Professor of Smart Structures and Rail Transit, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

  • Director, Hong Kong Branch of National Rail Transit Electrification and Automation Engineering Technology Research Center 

Project:
INTACT: Intelligent Tropical-storm-resilient System for Coastal Cities

 

Summary:
The project aims to minimise the losses caused by typhoons through establishing an intelligent tropical storm-resilient system for coastal cities. It devises a framework that enables efficient and accurate assessment of turbulence flows from sparse measurements. It will also quantify urbanenvironment tropical storm risks arising from complex urban aerodynamics. A real-time urban typhoon risk early-warning and management prototype will be made accessible to the public for guiding effective emergency responses, such as evacuation measures and the temporary reinforcement of glass panels.

 

Approved Budget*:   

HK$48.293 million

PolyU-led project funded under the STG 2023/24

PolyU-led projects funded under TRS 2023/24

Project coordinator:
Professor Zhang Weixiong

  • Chair Professor of Bioinformatics and Integrative Genomics, Department of Health Technology and Informatics and Department of Computing

  • Hong Kong Global STEM Scholar

Project:
Integrated Innovative Artificial Intelligence (AI), Genomic and Biomedical Technologies in Healthcare: Objective Diagnosis, Personalised Therapy, and Determining the Etiology of Major Mental Disorders

 

Summary:
The project proposes a paradigm shift from symptom-based diagnosis to AI-based, data-driven diagnosis and a personalised therapy approach. By integrating AI, genomics and biomedical technologies, the research team aims to create an explainable AI-enabled treatment planning system that can support reliable diagnosis and guide personalised repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation therapy.

 

Approved Budget*:   

Over HK$37 million

 

About the funding support under TRS and STG
The TRS aims to focus academic research efforts of the University Grants Committee (UGC)-funded universities on themes of strategic importance to the long-term development of Hong Kong. The maximum duration of each funded project is five years.

The STG is set up to support collaborative research in specific areas which can help Hong Kong overcome imminent challenges and capture emerging opportunities. The maximum duration of each project is five years, with a cost ceiling of HK$40 million (excluding on-costs).

 

* RGC provides 90% of the approved budget with the remaining 10% provided by coordinating and collaborating universities.