Top Taiwanese university, ASU seek closer collaboration
National Yang Ming Chiao Tun University president Chi-Hung Lin (second from right) and Arizona State University President Michael Crow pose for a photo together at Dreamscape Learn at the Creative Commons building on ASU's Tempe campus, Friday, Aug. 14. Photo by Deanna Dent/Arizona State University
Story highlights
National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, which has deep ties with TSMC in Taiwan, sent a delegation to ASU in August.
The two universities agreed to explore opportunities for faculty and student exchanges.
The Taiwanese university group visited Mirabella at ASU as it considers creating its own campus-based lifelong-learning community.
A university delegation from Taiwan was able to see Arizona State University’s innovation in action, far beyond the two institutions’ shared work in the semiconductor field.
Earlier this month, a delegation from National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University visited ASU and agreed to explore opportunities for faculty and student exchanges, as well as areas of potential collaboration.
The visit highlighted ASU’s efforts to forge ties with Taiwanese institutions as it works to boost the state’s semiconductor economy with research and workforce development.
Grace O’Sullivan, vice president of corporate engagement and strategic partnerships for ASU, said that NYCU will be a critical partner considering ASU’s work with TSMC, which has invested more than $265 billion in a huge manufacturing complex in Phoenix.
“What's important about why we want to work with them and learn from them is that they are located in the Hsinchu Science Park, co-located with TSMC headquarters, so they kind of grew up together as institutions in Taiwan,” she said.
“They have a deep history of working together.”
National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University conducts joint semiconductor research with TSMC and trains graduate students for careers in Taiwan’s semiconductor industry — the same areas that ASU is advancing in Arizona.
“We see them with the same innovative spirit as ASU,” O’Sullivan said of NYCU.
“And we’re eager to collaborate not only in semiconductors, but also across social sciences, biotech, medical engineering, quantum and physics. And they've also had one of the first engineering medical schools.”
During their visit, the group of 12 administrators from National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, including the university’s president, Chi-Hung Lin, saw several of ASU’s most innovative initiatives, including the ASU Biodesign Institute, the Compact X-ray Free Electron Laser project and the John Shufeldt School of Medicine and Medical Engineering anatomy lab.
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Leadership from National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University tests out Dreamscape Learn at the Creative Commons building on ASU's Tempe campus Friday, Aug. 14.
Photo by Deanna Dent/Arizona State University
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National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University conducts joint semiconductor research with TSMC and trains graduate students for careers in Taiwan’s semiconductor industry — the same areas that ASU is advancing in Arizona.
Photo by Deanna Dent/Arizona State University
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Members of the delegation from Taiwan were able to see ASU's innovation in action, far beyond the two institutions’ shared work in the semiconductor field.
Photo by Deanna Dent/Arizona State University
“They were really impressed to see our innovations in action. They were able to go to Dreamscape Learn and experience that, and they’re very interested in healthy aging, so part of the visit was seeing Mirabella at ASU,” O’Sullivan said.
National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University is exploring the development of a university-based retirement community on their campus, similar to Mirabella, according to Lindsey Beagley, executive director of longevity innovation at Mirabella.
“During their visit, they met an ASU student who lives in the community as an artist-in-residence, they talked with residents who take classes and mentor students, and they saw how Mirabella’s location on campus facilitates intergenerational connections,” she said.
Like many nations, Taiwan has experienced a demographic shift in which at least 20% of its population is over 65 years old.
“This shift brings challenges, but also new opportunities to innovate, to develop smart communities capable of supporting healthy aging, to support learning across the full life course, and to think creatively about how to productively engage the most experienced people in our society,” Beagley said.
“There are no institutions more capable of developing the field of longevity innovation than ASU and NYCU.”
The Taiwanese delegation also traveled to 850 PBC in downtown Phoenix to visit the Taiwan AI Smart Health Showcase Center, launched last fall with 12 Taiwan-based companies to accelerate health care and biomedical collaboration between the U.S. and Taiwan. The National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University Neural Engineering Lab is one of the companies featured in the showcase.
ASU President Michael Crow visited National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, one of the top universities in Taiwan, last fall to hear about one of the first biomedical engineering-based medical schools, similar to ASU’s new John Shufeldt School of Medicine and Medical Engineering.
During the Taiwanese visit to ASU earlier this month, the two universities signed a memorandum of understanding, agreeing to explore joint research projects, faculty visits, semester-long student exchanges and ways to develop undergraduate and graduate programs together.
“The international partnerships that hold up are the ones where students and faculty are going in both directions,” said Kyle Squires, ASU’s senior vice provost for engineering, computing and technology and dean of the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering.
“That's the standard we brought to our conversations with NYCU, and it points to specific work: dual degrees, faculty research ties, all the structures that make that kind of movement routine rather than exceptional.”
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National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University President Chi-Hung Lin (left) and Arizona State University President Michael Crow sign a memorandum of understanding on Aug. 14, agreeing to explore joint research projects, faculty visits, semester-long student exchanges, and ways to develop undergraduate and graduate programs together.
Photo by Deanna Dent/Arizona State University
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Leadership from National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University and Arizona State University pose for a group portrait at the Fulton Center on Friday, Aug. 14th.
Photo by Deanna Dent/Arizona State University
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