Universities harness AI to ‘modernise’ traditional medicine

CHINA-HONG KONG

Hong Kong is boosting research into traditional Chinese medicine as part of China’s bid to upgrade the scientific basis and promote the use of ancient herbal remedies, tapping into the power of artificial intelligence to analyse data on traditional treatments used informally across East and Southeast Asia.

The School of Chinese Medicine at Hong Kong Baptist University is currently a regional leader in research into old remedies.

“We have a very active programme in drug discovery. A lot of these [Chinese medicines] are based on botanical drugs originally suggested by doctors a thousand years ago,” Martin Wong, provost of Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU), told University World News.

The “Hong Kong and the Chinese governments want Hong Kong to experiment and come up with a new model of how to have Western medicine and Chinese medicine combined,” he said.

HKBU’s long-established School of Chinese Medicine was the first Hong Kong government-funded institution to offer undergraduate programmes in Chinese medicine and pharmacy. According to Wong, these combine elements of Western medicine as well.

This month the Hong Kong government announced that the city’s first Chinese Medicine Hospital, currently under construction, will open this December. HKBU has been a key advisor for the government-funded hospital, which it will manage.

Establishing Hong Kong as a centre for Chinese medicine and combining Chinese and Western medicine will also boost research into traditional medicines and could facilitate clinical trials, experts said.

Collaboration agreements with HKBU and Hong Kong’s two medical schools at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) and Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) – both with global reputations in biomedical research – were signed on 9 September. Experts at the three universities will support the new hospital’s clinical services, going beyond confining the use of Chinese medicines to primary healthcare. The universities will also conduct research there.

Research on Chinese herbal remedies

HKBU is using modern data science and AI to research herbal medicines with a view to developing new drugs aimed at the global market as well as modernising Chinese medicine, said Wong. AI is also used to analyse chemical compounds in plants.

In 2015 Chinese scientist Tu Youyou was awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine for her discovery of artemisinin, a groundbreaking antimalarial drug derived from a plant (Artemisia annua) mentioned in ancient Chinese texts.

Tu isolated artemisinin from the Chinese herb known as Qinghaosu in the 1970s and conducted clinical trials, which eventually led to the development of artemisinin-based combination drugs, now widely used around the world.

Ryu Aiping, an expert in HKBU’s Chinese medicine faculty, told University World News: “We envision a future where data science and AI illuminate what Chinese medicine research has long intimated, providing deeper insights into health classifications and compound interventions.”

Wong explained: “At HKBU we start with a lot of clinical data based on historical [materials] about what doctors prescribed for patients with certain medical problems and what these plants are good for. Once we have that, we want to develop some drugs based on the clinical data.”

“We do very sophisticated analysis using AI and figure out a lot of potential drug candidates. Once you have these, you go onto the next stage – modern biochemistry, pharmacology, toxicology, to see where these are viable and safe.”

Wong said the aim was to file drug patents based on traditional Chinese medicines. Several drugs developed at HKBU have been given FDA (US Food and Drug Administration) approval for clinical trials, he pointed out.

One of these has already received “orphan drug” designation from the FDA to treat the rare disease myofibrillar myopathy, a neuromuscular disorder primarily caused by genetic mutations.

A report titled Evolving Legacy: Decoding the scientific trajectory of Chinese medicine released in June by HKBU and Elsevier, the first bibliometric analysis of Chinese medicine covering the past decade, revealed that research papers on Chinese medicine nearly tripled between 2014 and 2023.

The report found that Chinese medicine researchers, mainly in mainland China, are producing high-impact work and highlighted growing interdisciplinary collaboration and increasing international research partnerships.

But it acknowledged that for Chinese medicine to become mainstream, global, transparent and evidence-based work was required.

“To elevate its scientific profile, key strategies include developing internationally accepted clinical guidelines through expert consensus, enhancing trial reporting standards to improve research quality, and fostering interdisciplinary, cross-regional collaboration to drive innovation and systemic impact,” according to the report.

Western vs Chinese approaches

Ryu explained that the approaches employed in Western drug development and Chinese medicine were different, with Chinese medicine emphasising combination therapies and a “whole body” approach to symptoms of disease, while also recognising social and environmental factors.

“Data science and AI integration are shaping the future of Chinese medicine. We’re witnessing how traditional holistic principles can be enhanced,” he said, while also warning that an over-reliance on AI could harm the holistic and personalised nature of Chinese medicine.

“We should use AI to enhance the precision, efficiency, and accessibility of Chinese medicine while preserving its core principles,” he added.

Western medicines isolate medical diseases by diagnosis with no linkage between diseases, he noted, but with Chinese medicine “we can find some connection between two different diseases that would modify current interventions [treatments]”.

He employs a “systems medicine” approach which focuses on complex interactions between diseases, not only single disease treatment, recognising that diseases like diabetes and hypertension interact dynamically in the human body.

While the Western approach isolates single compounds and incorporates the active ingredient into drugs based on a specific diagnosis and without linkage between diseases, Chinese medicine combines herbs, which typically contain multiple compounds that work synergistically, according to Ryu.

“The future of medicine lies in [understanding] these complex interactions and moving beyond the traditional single-compound drug discovery model,” he said.

He believes treatment efficacy can be improved by combining two to three compounds. “Chinese medicine can actually show us how future medicine could be,” he said enthusiastically.

Robust clinical evidence is crucial for acceptance, however, he said.

“Clinical trials have become more and more important to prove efficacy,” Ryu said, noting: “Worldwide, more and more clinical trials on Chinese herbal products have been published.

“In all the clinical trials I conduct, I collect more samples and try to analyse, with the help of AI, the difference in responsiveness and then try to find the reason for those non-responsive cases.

“So rather than pure clinical trials on efficacy [this approach] would add a stage of clinical trial plus clinical pharmacology.”

Dual fluency

HKBU’s Chinese medicine degrees are popular with mainland students, but only one in six applicants from outside Hong Kong are admitted to the HKBU programmes, according to Wong. The school also offers a Masters in Chinese Medicine Drug Discovery.

Ryu believes the next generation of Chinese medicine professionals will require “deep, dual fluency – not only in traditional Chinese medicine, but also in contemporary biomedical sciences.”

“Our graduates must master biomedical knowledge and clinical competence on par with their peers in Western medicine. This approach will raise a cohort of practitioners who are both guardians of tradition and agents of innovation. They will ensure that Chinese medicine continues to evolve and contribute meaningfully to global health,” he said.