The President of Takara Bio Inc.Professor Ikunoshin Kato And the Chief Executive Officer MolMed SPA Claudio Bordignon Visited Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute and Hospital

On June 12th, the president of Takara Bio Inc. Professor Ikunoshin Kato and the general manager professor Yoh Hamaoka from Japan and the chief executive officer of Molmed SPA Claudio Bordignon from Italy visited Tianjin Medical University Cancer Institute and Hospital (TMUCIH).Takara Bio Inc. has been collaborating with TMUCIH since 1994. The Tianjin Medical Biotechnique Application and Research Center is the fruit of the corporation. The products of Takara Bio Inc. supply over 60% of the Japanese research reagent market and are much in demand overseas. MolMed SPA is the partner of Takara Bio Inc, which is an Italian gene-therapy company to develop gene therapy/gene medicine in Asia. One of the protocols in the collaboration is HSV-TK which targets leukemia and other hematological malignancies.

Professor Ikunoshin Kato introduced the corporation project to the president of TMUCIH Xi-Shan Hao. The two parties discussed some issues related to this project under a friendly atmosphere. Vice President Ying Wang showed the foreign guests around the hospital. Professor Claudio Bordignon presented HSV-TK project in detail and discussed feasibility of the ¡°Suicide Gene Therapy¡± in China with Chinese colleagues. President Xi-shan Haom, Vice President Ying Wang, Vice President Qiang Li and some clinical doctors participated the discussion until a consensus was reached about the therapy.

This visit will be of positive significance to the collaboration and academic exchange between the two institutes and TMUCIH.