On July 1, 2021, Associate Professor Charnchai Panthongviriyakul, MD, President, Khon Kaen University, officially opened the webinar titled “The 3rd Anniversary Symposium for Double Degree Program”. This was the first time it was organized online and hosted by the Faculty of Life Sciences, Kumamoto University, Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, and the Medical Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Program and Precision Medical Microbiology Program, Departments of Biochemistry and Microbiology, Faculty of Medicine, Khon Kaen University.
The purpose of the symposium was to encourage exchange cutting-edge research and technologies and to promote discussion between professors, lecturers, researchers, medical staff and students from Kumamoto University, Japan and members of the Double Degree Program (DDP) Network in Thailand.
The DDP Symposium was first held in 2018 at Kumamoto University, Japan organized by the Graduate School of Medical Sciences, Kumamoto University. The second symposium was organized by the Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University, Thailand in 2019 and the 3rd symposium was hosted by the Faculty of Medicine, Khon Kaen University, Thailand. Due to Covid-19 pandemic, the 3rd symposium was postponed from 2020 to 2021. This year, it had 27 international and national speakers from prestigious universities and institutions.
The DDP agreement between Kumamoto University and Khon Kaen University was initiated in 2017, and now also includes Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital, Mahidol University from central Thailand, Faculties of Medicine and Associated Medical Sciences, Chiang Mai University from the north, and the Faculty of Medicine, Prince of Songkla University in the south.
The Graduate School of Medical Sciences, Kumamoto University and Faculty of Medicine, Khon Kaen University have long-standing academic and research collaborations and student and faculty exchanges. Currently, there are over 20 joint research publications from these two schools. There are 5 postgraduate students from the Faculty of Medicine, Khon Kaen University enrolled in the Double Degree Program and one will graduate this year. In addition, over 20 staff and students from the Faculty of Medicine, Khon Kaen University have visited Kumamoto University to learn and conduct research.
This year’s symposium also had a 3–minute Research Competition: 3MR, for DPP network students.
The Winner of the non-communicable diseases session was Miss Khin TheNu Aye, who presented on ‘Effect of Gallic acid on Kinetic Pirarubicin Uptake in K562/Dox Cancer Cells: Spectroscopic Study’ and the winner for Communicable diseases session was Miss Nattaya Tonglao, who presented on ‘The synergistics of chitosan and ceftazidime combination on B. pseudomaliei biofilm’.
