A multidisciplinary learning approach has been a trend in university. You have the flexibility to mix and match the education content beyond what you major in. Yeung Tsz Yi, Rachel, who has completed her undergraduate degree in Biomedical Science, is no stranger to this kind of interdisciplinarity. She was the team leader who participated in the 8th Hong Kong University Student Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition, where her team combined their medical science knowledge with business. Encouragingly, they won the Third Prize under the category of Entrepreneurship Proposal.

Rachel and her teammates attended the award ceremony.

Their idea was about a perspiration-powered bio-sensing ring, dedicated for diabetic patients to detect their blood glucose levels via sweat. After witnessing the troubles in external charging and hardship in finger pricking on patients with diabetes, Rachel and her team were propelled empathetically to improve the situation of this intrusive method. Their beliefs were all started in a special course offered by the Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine – Contemporary Topics in Biomedical Technology. The perspectives from the course fueled them with confidence that they could further push the frontier technologies in the biomedical technology field by using healthcare science, engineering, and business.

The recipe for their team’s invention entailed ingredients of extensive paper reviews for a deeper understanding of this disease, continuous advice-seeking sessions with professors in the field, and regular tracks of the latest wearable technology in the business market. Their genuine passion for bringing transformative impacts in bettering human life was the great momentum, pouring these efforts into the competition.

Sharing moments with peers and teammates during the competition is truly one of the highlights.

“This entrepreneurship competition is an awesome youthful and memorable checkpoint of my university life!”, Rachel shared. It was an amazing opportunity to be able to try on both hats of a scientist and an entrepreneur. She wishes to express her gratefulness to all teachers who have helped her along the journey, and friends in the team who firmly ventured all the uncertainties and succeeded together till the end.