Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore is collaborating with University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (UCAS) for artificial intelligence research and Japan's flagship research institute in the natural sciences, RIKEN for human biology studies.

A five year agreement has been finalized with UCAS for enhancing joint research collaborations and for exchanging students, academic and research staff. The main objective is to translate the existing and future research advances in artificial intelligence (AI), Internet-of-Things (IoT), big data analytics and virtual reality (VR) into useful commercial products and services.

A partnership between NTU-University of British Columbia (UBC) Research Centre of Excellence in Active Living for the Elderly (LILY) and UCAS will be used to develop potential applications in healthy ageing and education.

Deep scientific expertise and state-of-the-art research facilities of both NTU and RIKEN will be brought together for establishing a joint research center each in Singapore and Japan. The aim is to focus on the interaction between mind and body during pre-clinical phases of various diseases when important feasibility testing and data collection are conducted.

This collaboration also intends to discover the complex mechanisms governing the interaction between the mind and body, effects of social stress on microorganism ecosystem in the intestines, for devising more naturalistic therapies. There are also plans of developing novel biomarkers for early predictive diagnosis and treatment of diseases. Artificial intelligence will also be applied to the digital medical records of the patients for an early detection of diseases.