Nobel laureate Leland H. Hartwell will help promote biomedical research cooperation between Tai-wan and the US, National Science Council Chairman Wei Che-ho (
Hartwell, one of three men who won the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine, visited Wei yesterday to discuss potential research cooperation in biomedicine between Tai-wan and leading research institutes in the US.
Hartwell is the president and director of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington, one of the largest independent biomedical research institutes in the US.
PHOTO: CHEN CHENG-CHANG, TAIPEI TIMES
He arrived in Taiwan on Monday and will leave tomorrow.
He was accompanied by professors from National Taiwan University to his meeting with National Science Council officials.
Hartwell declined to answer reporters questions after his one-hour closed-door discussion.
However, NSC officials said that Hartwell has spent several days visiting leading biomedical research centers in Taiwan and they quoted him as saying that Taiwan's performance in certain fields was outstanding.
The officials said Hartwell believes that Taiwan should invest more manpower in biomedical fields, including genome research.
"The more advanced the field of science, the more international collaboration we need" said Wei, adding that this is why the council is giving extraordinary support to research on genetics, biomedicine and the search of anti-matter in space.
Council officials say Hartwell invited Taiwanese officials and biomedical experts to visit the Hutchinson center in order to further specify potential collaborative fields.
"We hope to systematically collaborate with the center and with other similar institutes," said Dr. Chen Ding-shinn (
Chen said that Hartwell stressed that the Hutchinson Center has a mission of globalization that is mainly focused on both the creation of new knowledge and the commercialization of biomedical products.
"For this reason, I think the center would also be interested in studying common cancers in Asia, such as liver cancer, nasopharyngeal carcinoma, gastric cancer and others," Chen said.
Chen said that Taiwan should aggressively respond to Hartwell's sincerity, which aims to boost biomedical collaboration that both sides can benefit from.
Hartwell, 62, spent most of his research career at the University of Washington's Department of Gene-tics, where he used yeast cells to study fundamental problems of cell biology related to cancer.
His research provided the foundation for understanding how normal cells divide and the mechanisms leading to the uncontrolled growth of cancer cells.
This is Hartwell's first visit to Taiwan and council officials said that the country had made a positive impression on him.
Hartwell is also expected to meet with President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) before leaving Taiwan.
He will also visit Singapore, which has reportedly offered him a position as economic development advisor to its government.
According to Chen Pei-jer (
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