Pythia Biotech, an organ-on-a-chip company, announced on 9 June that it will sign a Memorandum of Understanding with Merck Taiwan, a company specialised in healthcare, life sciences and electronics, to explore a new generation of drug development and testing platforms that will replace traditional cell-based and animal-based tests by building microenvironments that accurately simulate human physiology through a proprietary "organ-on-a-chip" technology. It is hoped that this will lead to a revolutionary breakthrough in the development of new drugs.

At the MOU signing ceremony, Mr. Weilun Sun, CEO of Oracle Biotech, Ms. BoonHuey Ee, General Manager of Merck Healthcare Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau, Mr. Steven Johnston, Vice President and Head of Technology Transformation and Enablement of Merck Group and Prof. Ping-Chiang Lyu, Senior Vice President, National Tsing Hua University, were joined by vice presidents from Taipei Medical University and Shuang Ho Hospital, and representatitives from National Laboratory Animal Center, as well as leading institutes DCB and ITRI.

In addition to the application of organ chips in the development of new drugs, the research team is also exploring the use of this technology in personalized medicine to design more precise treatment plans and targets," said Mr. Weilun Sun. In the case of advanced lung cancer, for example, resistance to targeted drugs and side effects usually occur within six months to a year, leaving patients suffering physically and emotionally. Mr. Sun expressed his thanks to the National Science and Technology Council for facilitating this collaboration with Merck.