CUHK
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The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) and Utrecht University (UU) in the Netherlands held the opening ceremony of the CUHK-UU Joint Centre for Language, Mind and Brain at CUHK recently.  The Joint Centre provides an international platform to promote interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research in language, mind and brain.  It represents an innovative effort to synergize and combine the strengths of CUHK and UU in areas involving the biological basis of language learning and development, cognitive neuroscience, and speech-language therapy.  Prof. Joseph Sung, Vice-Chancellor and President of CUHK; Mr. Wilfred Mohr, Consul General, Netherlands Consulate General in Hong Kong and Macao; and Mr. Vincent Piket, Head of the European Union office to Hong Kong and Macau, officiated at the ceremony.  The two universities also held the Symposium on the Neurogenetics of Language and Cognition on CUHK campus and at the Shenzhen Research Institute two days in a row to celebrate the launch of the Joint Centre. 

At the opening ceremony of the Joint Centre, Prof. Joseph Sung remarked, ‘The establishment of the Joint Centre marks an important milestone in CUHK’s internationalization efforts.  By forging international partnerships, we hope to join forces with world class researchers and build strong research teams with the potential to conduct ground-breaking research in language, mind and brain.  We also hope the new Joint Centre with Utrecht University will develop and inspire more group research in Arts and Humanities while building bridges with social sciences, biomedical sciences and medicine.’ 

Recent advances in genetics such as Whole Genome Exome Sequencing and in human neuroscience such as high-imaging functional MRI have allowed for an unprecedented look into the human mind and language functions from the molecule to behavior.  The Symposium on the Neurogenetics of Language and Cognition featured keynote speakers from both UU and CUHK for exchanging state-of-the-art research on language, cognition, brain and genes from an interdisciplinary and translational perspective. The two-day event provided impetus and momentum to promote research on language, mind and the brain in Hong Kong and Shenzhen. It also strengthened research collaboration and academic exchange in neuroscience of language and cognition between Hong Kong, Shenzhen and the Netherlands.