The launch of first 'personalized medicine hi-tech convergence research group’ in the country
Leading popularization of highest class medical services, presenting as strategic project of Daegu Sinseo Hi-Tech Complex
[2009-9-14]
Yeungnam University (president Lee, Hyo-Soo) opens up the "Age of Personalized Medicine"
Recently, Yeungnam University has launched the first 'personalized medicine hi-tech convergence research group’ in the country, settled the medical service of highest class standard in our country at an early stage and expressed that it would provide active support for promotion of successful project for Daegu Sinseo Hi-Tech Medical Complex.
The research team with Professor Park, Yong-Ha of School of Biotechnology, consists of a large number of about 50 professors in BT, NT and IT fields such as Professor Kim, Jung-Ae of College of Pharmacy, Professor Chang, Byung-Ik of College of Medicine, Professor Ju, Sang-Woo of College of Engineering and Professor Moon, Yong-Sun of College of Natural Resources. These people will get to perform a high tech convergence research systematically to provide personalized medical services by pulling down a barrier between academics.
'Personalized Medicine' means preventing and treating diseases according to different biological characteristics of each individual patient and expects to become a megatrend of future medical industry. Recently, a research & development enabling more precise prediction, prevention and treatment of diseases is being performed by analyzing and utilizing individual genetic information.
The research of personalized medicine being performed throughout the entire field of biotechnology and medical science including molecular diagnosis, target treatment, personalized medication and precision medicine, etc enables us to manage patients in general by predicting diseases, finding out high risk categories in advance and calculating each individual disease risks. Not only that, but it is expected to bring a landmark change of paradigm where even the prediction of disease types by descendants becomes possible.
For an example, Macrogen has recently signed an agreement for promoting development of genome analysis service and personalized medicines with Boryung Pharmaceutical Group to release 'G-Scanning' as the first product of joint business. This service lets us know the information on diseases such as mental retardation, autism, epilepsy, learning disability and various forms of rare diseases from genome abnormality using the screening test method of scanning and analyzing the genome parts of about 1,440 places of chromosome in our entire body. The decoded information is stored for 10 years if desired by consumer and the genetic information of related genome can be updated. Also by referring to individual genetic data, the times when most effective medicine for each individual is prescribed and even new drugs considering unique genetic characteristics of each race are developed will come within several years.
For this, the Director of research team Park, Yong-Ha (50) has anticipated that "if the 'Korean style' personalized medicine industry applying hi-tech convergence technology of BT, IT and NT based on the tradition of Sasang Constitutional Medicine develops centered on Sinseo Hi-Tech Complex, it would become a great driver for improving national competitiveness of Republic of Korea as well as local areas" by saying that "As much as the coming of 'the age of personalized medicine' is being predicted by specialists between 2011 to 2020, the domestic medical industry would also have to move quickly to prepare for the expanding trend of global medical market. Accordingly, our research team will lead in the advancement of medical welfare in which all citizens are able to use highest quality medical services without any cost burden by lowering the current personal genetic information analysis cost of 300,000 US$ level to 1,000 US$ level within several years and finally to 100 US$ level by establishing a strong research network with highest specialists in domestic and foreign BT/IT/NT fields while especially concentrating all capabilities on university level such as forming a basis for enterprise support and securing research activity funds.
