Background

Vietnam is a rapidly developing, socially dynamic country, where interest in biomedical engineering activities has grown considerably in recent years. The leadership of the Vietnamese government, and of research and educational institutions, are well aware of the importance of this field for the development of the country and have instituted policies to promote its development. The political, economic and social environment within the country offers unique opportunities for the international community and this conference was intended to provide a vehicle for the sharing of experiences; development of support and collaboration networks for research; and exchange of ideas on how to improve the educational and entrepreneurial environment to better address the urgent needs of Vietnam.

History

In January 2004, under the sponsorship of the U.S. National Science Foundation, Professor Vo Van Toi of the Biomedical Engineering Department of Tufts University, Medford Massachusetts USA, led a U.S. delegation that consisted of Biomedical Engineering professors from different universities in the United States, and visited several universities and research institutions in Vietnam to assess the state of development of this field. This delegation proposed a five year plan that was enthusiastically embraced by the international scientific communities to actively develop collaborations with Vietnam. More information.

Within this framework, in July 2005, the First International Conference on the Development of Biomedical Engineering in Vietnam was held in Ho Chi Minh City. From that conference a Consortium of Vietnam- International Universities was created to advise and assist the development of Biomedical Engineering in Vietnamese universities. More information: Introduction and Website of the First Conference.

 Some international delegations in the Conference

In July 2007, the Second International Conference on the Development of Biomedical Engineering in Vietnam was held in Hanoi. During this event the Vietnamese Association of Biomedical Science and Engineering was endorsed by the Asia-Pacific International Molecular Biology Network (AIMBN), Biomedical Engineering Society Singapore (BESS), International Federation for Medical and Biological Engineering (IFMBE), Société Française de Génie Biologique et Médical (SFGBM) and IFMBE Asia-Pacific Working Group.

In March 2009, International University (IU) established its Biomedical Engineering (BME) Department and the first accredited Engineer in BME degree in Vietnam (code: 52.42.02.04). IU is a member of Vietnam National Universities – Ho Chi Minh City (VNU-HCM), one of the two elite university networks in Vietnam, and is the first public university in Vietnam that teaches all courses in English. It was created as a new model to modernize the higher education in Vietnam. The BME Department at IU has since coordinated with its national and international counterparts to promote the activities of this field in Vietnam. More information.

In January 2010, the Third International Conference on the Development of Biomedical Engineering in Vietnam was organized by IU in Ho Chi Minh City. It reflected the steady growth of the activities in this field in Vietnam, and featured the contributions of researchers of 21 countries, including: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Poland, Russia, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, United Kingdom, the United States and Vietnam. The Conference was endorsed by the International Federation for Medical and Biological Engineering (IFMBE). It also hosted the Clinical Engineering Workshop of the IFMBE Asia Pacific Working Group. The contributed papers were published in the IFMBE Proceedings Series by Springer (ISBN 978-3-642-12019-0). More information.

In January 2012, the Fourth International Conference on the Development of Biomedical Engineering in Vietnam was organized in Ho Chi Minh City as a Mega-conference. It was kicked off by the Regenerative Medicine Conference (Jan 8-10, 2012) with the theme “BUILDING A FACE” USING A REGENERATIVE MEDICINE APPROACH”, endorsed mainly by the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS) and co-organized by Professor Stephen E. Feinberg, University of Michigan Health System, USA, Professor Anh Le, University of Southern California, USA and Professor Vo Van Toi, International University-VNU HCM, Vietnam. It was followed by the Computational Medicine Conference, endorsed mainly by the Computational Surgery International Network (COSINE) and the Computational Molecular Medicine of German National Funding Agency; and the General Biomedical Engineering Conference, endorsed mainly by the International Federation for Medical and Biological Engineering (IFMBE) (Jan 10-12) and co-organized by Professor Paolo Carloni, German Research School for Simulation Sciences GmbH, Germany, Professor Marc Garbey, University of Houston, USA and Professor Vo Van Toi, International University-VNU HCM, Vietnam. It featured the contributions of 435 scientists from 30 countries, including: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, China, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Iran, Italy, Japan, Jordan, Korea, Malaysia, Netherlands, Pakistan, Poland, Russian Federation, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States, Uruguay and Viet Nam. More information.

The Fifth International Conference on the Development of Biomedical Engineering was organized by International University of Vietnam National Universities in Ho Chi Minh City from June 16-18, 2014. Professor Vo Van Toi of this institution was the Conference General Chair. This Fifth International Conference is a very special event. It officially opens the season for celebration of the 20^th Anniversary of Vietnam National Universities – Ho Chi Minh City. It also marks the 10^th Anniversary of International University and the 5^th Anniversary of the Biomedical Engineering Department. This Conference features 231 papers of 532 authors and co-authors from 26 countries including Australia, Bangladesh, Belgium, Canada, China, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Norway, Singapore, Slovenia, Switzerland, Taiwan, Turkey, United Kingdom, USA and Vietnam. Almost all Vietnamese institutions have their delegations. Besides Vietnam the 2 countries that have the most contributors are the USA and Australia. The plenary session features the lectures on the progress in different fields of Biomedical Engineering by distinguished keynote speakers such as Prof. Ratko Magjarevic, President of IFMBE; Dr. Robert A. Lieberman, Vice-President of International Society for Optics and Photonics SPIE; Prof. Vo-Dinh Tuan, Director of Fitzpatrick Institute for Photonics, Duke University, USA; Prof. Christian Griesinger, Director of Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry, Germany; Prof. Anja Boisen, Director of VKR Centre Of Excellence ‘NAMEC’, Denmark; Prof. Yin Xiao, Director of Australia-China Centre for Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine, Queensland University of Technology, Australia; Prof. Yukio Nagasaki, Department of Materials Science and Medical Sciences, University of Tsukuba, Japan; and Prof. Fong-Chin Su, President of Taiwanese Society of Biomedical Engineering, Director, Medical Device Innovation Center, National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan. The contributed papers will continue to be published in the IFMBE Proceedings Series by Springer.

The social events are also organized to introduce to the international guests the Vietnamese culture. We would like to thank the following sponsors: Vietnam National Universities –HCMC and International University Office of Naval Research Global, Arizona State University, Alberta University, VikoMed, Trung Sơn (T.S.S.E.), Saigon Instrumentation Joint Stock Company (Saigon ISC), ITS Vietnam, Saigon Scientists, and National Instruments. Special this year SPIE (USA), Technical Co-sponsor, gives two awards to student papers in the field of Biophotonics.

More information on the Mega-conference can be found at: http://csc.hcmiu.edu.vn/bmeconf/bme2014/ 

 The presentors of the Fifth International Conference on the Development of Biomedical Engineering

The 6th International Conference on the Development of Biomedical Engineering in Vietnam was organized by International University (IU) of Vietnam National Universities in Ho Chi Minh City (VNU-HCM), from June 27-29, 2016. More information on the BME6 can be found at: http://csc.hcmiu.edu.vn/bmeconf/bme2016