News

The University of Hong Kong secured three spots in the "Top 10 Innovation & Technology News in Hong Kong 2025”, organized by the Beijing-Hong Kong Academic Exchange Centre. The winners were selected through an online public vote involving over 4,000 participants from academia, research, education, and other sectors.

One of the awarded projects is the innovative “dual immunotherapy” for advanced liver cancer, led by Professor Thomas Yau, Clinical Associate Professor in the Centre of Cancer Medicine and Department of Medicine, School of Clinical Medicine, HKUMed. The novel approach combines two drugs, nivolumab and ipilimumab, to activate the immune system against advanced liver cancer cells. Professor Yau led his team, in collaboration with the HKU Clinical Trials Centre, to launch clinical trials starting from 2016 to evaluate its efficacy, safety and the effectiveness in prolonging patient survival. It has confirmed that this new therapy significantly improves survival rates and tumour control. This therapy has successfully received approvals from the US FDA, EMA, and China’s NMPA for use as a first-line treatment for adult patients with unresectable or metastatic liver cancer.

For more details on this research, please visit the website below: https://www.hku.hk/press/press-releases/detail/28418.html

Thank you to all the patients who participated in the trial targetting the use of a ‘dual immunotherapy’ combination—nivolumab and ipilimumab (NIVO+IPI) — in the treatment of liver cancer patients between 2020 to 2021. This innovative treatment has proved to significantly improve survival rates and tumour control compared to current first-line treatments, lenvatinib and sorafenib. Recently it was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and China's National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) for global use, offering new hope to liver cancer patients worldwide. 

Thank you to all the patients who participated in the oral medication study related to Inavolisib-based therapy in PIK3CA-mutated advanced breast cancer (CTC1946) between 2020 and 2023. We have the honor to inform you that the clinical data of the Phase 3 clinical trial has been submitted to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the oral medication has been approved, paving ways for new treatment targeting breast cancer.

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Sincere gratitude to all the volunteers participating in the study related to biological therapies targeting eosinophilic asthma earlier in 2019 (CTC1843), leading by the University of Hong Kong Clinical Trials Centre (HKU-CTC). We are thrilled to announce that the research data of the Phase III Study has already been submitted to the National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) for evaluation. This will certainly bring hopes to severe asthma patients if approval is granted by the NMPA eventually!

In May of 2022, the HKU medical research team collaborated with China National Biotec Group (Sinopharm) to conduct a large-scale clinical study on an Omicron-targeting COVID-19 vaccine. After 13 months of hard work, the study has finally been completed on 2 November 2023! HKU Clinical Trials Centre (HKU-CTC) was responsible for planning and managing the whole study which involved 1,800 volunteers. It was a real challenge to run such a large study within a tight timeframe. Extensive efforts were made to facilitate the study, including setting up a temporary research center at the Sun Yat Sen Memorial Park Sports Centre to accommodate the large group of volunteers. We also announced the study and invited participation across the city by all means, such as social media channels, press releases, newspaper/bus/minibus/MTR advertisements, and leaflet distribution. We sincerely thank all our volunteers for their tremendous support, and the research team for their unwavering efforts. Without the extensive support by the public, this remarkable goal could never be accomplished!

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Available in Chinese only

Available in Chinese only.

After four months of dedicated effort, we have successfully completed the recruitment of volunteers. Over 1800 individuals participated in this clinical study and received the investigational vaccine, surpassing the targeted number of participants. We will continue to gather data from the vaccine study and plan to conduct the final analysis by the end of 2022, with the aim of expediting the introduction of the Omicron COVID-19 vaccine.

We extend our heartfelt gratitude to all those who actively took part in this research as participants and to those who shared research information with their family and friends. Your tremendous support is highly appreciated, as it demonstrates your willingness to accompany us on this journey of vaccine development.