The Institute's close collaboration with the Shiga University of Medical Science has helped enrich the medicine-related aspects of its curriculum and led to noteworthy results in learning material development and joint lectures. The program was selected as part of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology's 2008 Strategic Educational Program in Collaboration with Universities.
Offering joint courses in subjects such as medicine and bioethics
Our joint learning material development efforts yielded embedded brain specimens, which make it possible to learn human anatomy. The program has yielded results in areas such as the creation of three-dimensional images of organs using computer graphics, research into the influenza virus and health-related genes, and development of learning materials.
Our program of joint lectures and lab work was started by a department member of the Shiga University of Medical Science with a lecture on medical biology for third-year students. We're also working to enrich our medicine-related graduate curriculum, for example by holding a Special Lecture of Genetics and Cell Biology.
Joint research by department members into the production of disease models using Japanese killifish as part of a genome-based drug discovery effort has attracted attention, and the Institute's department and staff development efforts continue to make good progress.
Enhancing partnerships in preparation to open a joint graduate school
As part of a new experiment, the Institute is offering joint lectures with the Shiga University of Medical Science using its two-way remote learning system.
Joint research efforts include a microorganism study being pursued at the Institute by a graduate student from the Shiga University of Medical Science, and the two institutions plan to conduct a new joint project to create models of human diseases using the Japanese killifish.
Based on these and similar partnerships, the Institute has created a working group to prepare to open a joint graduates school.
An international three-university partnership that transcends national borders
Northeastern University in China joined the Institute and the Shiga University of Medical Science in 2010 to create a revolutionary new three-university alliance that transcends national borders. By combining and drawing on each institution's area of expertise--medical informatics at Northeastern University, clinical medicine and medical research
at the Shiga University of Medical Science, and biotechnology and bioinformatics at the Institute--the partners are moving toward the creation of a new academic domain of inquiry.
Going forward, the three institutions plan to pursue joint research into common subjects as well as exchanges of international students and department members.