Abstract

Developing methods to answer scientific questions is one of the practical approaches for doing science. The optical microscopy, for example, has been a fundamental method of biological or medical discovery for more than three centuries. Building systems or tools to solve current issues existed in the world (e.g., infectious or chronic diseases) is also one of the attracting projects that we can involve and contribute. Due to this reason, for last few years, we have developed multiple “simple” biotechnologies, which can be used in both developing and developed worlds.

We have been attempting to differentially diagnose different blister-based diseases such as bullous pemphigoid and pemphigus vulgaris through the specific biomarker in the blister (i.e., liquid biopsy), and have even examined burn blister fluids as a means of determining burn thickness. When we perfect the process for using paper-based ELISA to differentially diagnose different blister-based diseases, we would attempt to commercialize our efforts into a commercially available product, i.e., potential for the emergency room or the clinics.

During this seminar talk, I will talk about what we are currently working on at National Tsing Hua University including paper-based diagnostic devices for the diagnosis of various diseases with their clinical validations in different divisions of medicine.

Biography

Chao-Min Cheng received his Ph. D. in 2009 from Carnegie Mellon University (Biomedical Engineering Department). He then did his post-doctoral training with Prof. George M. Whitesides at Harvard University where he helped develop paper diagnostic systems to address global public health concerns. He is currently a tenured professor at National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan, where he started in the summer of 2011, and recently has been selected as the Fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry. He has been blessed to receive “Distinguished Young Investigator Research Grant” three times from Taiwan’s Ministry of Science and Technology, “Excellent Performance on Intellectual Property & Technology Transfer” by his school twice (2015 and 2018), “Ta-You Wu Memorial Award” and Outstanding Research Award from Taiwan’s Ministry of Science and Technology. He was also an invited attendee for the NAS Sackler Colloquium at the National Academy of Sciences, and his research was highlighted in the National Academies–Keck Futures Initiative, Scientific American, Chemistry World, New York Times, and Lab on a Chip (along with a number of other media outlets). In addition, nine journal papers and reviews have been selected as journal cover articles. His general research interests focus on developing diagnostic devices for public health involving translational medicine, analytical biochemistry, and cellular and molecular biomechanics. He has been currently an Associate Editor in Journal of Cellular and Molecular Medicine, and an Editorial Board Member in Sensor Letters, Diagnostics and Scientific Reports. He also has served as a consultant for biotechnologically relevant companies around the world with about 50 patents either granted or pending (Taiwan, China, U.S.), and two start-up companies (one with Prof. Robert S. Langer at MIT).