From the 6th-8th August 2018, three researchers from the Department of Chemical Sciences: Dr. Lim Lee Hoon, Dr. Mohammad Hilni bin Harun Sani and Dr. Fairuzeta binti Haji Md. Ja’afar attended the 2nd joint symposium between Osaka University and Bruneian Higher Education Institutions held at Sawai Hall, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Osaka University, Osaka, Japan.

The symposium was divided into three different sessions centering around areas of biodiversity, Halal research and nanomaterials cluster. The plenary address was delivered by Prof. Dr. Hjh Zohrah Haji Sulaiman, Vice-Chancellor, Universiti Teknologi Brunei (UTB). Following on with the biodiversity trend, Mrs. Hajah Normah Jamil, the founder of Ihada and special collaborative professor of Osaka University (ASEAN campus, Brunei) gave an overview of the main research clusters in Brunei, with particular focus on Brunei’s biodiversity.

In the nanomaterials session, Dr. Hilni presented his research on synthesising nanomaterials using mixed-metal oxides (MMO). Dr. Lim Lee Hoon presented in the Halal Sciences session, as her talk on quantitative determination of additives is relevant to Halal technologies. An excess of additives may be detrimental to human health, which can be considered “Halal” or “Haram” for consumption. Her research focuses on method development for detection of additives, especially when at low concentrations of parts per billion (ppb).

Aside from discussions of possible collaborations between the universities, participants were also given the opportunity to visit to Japan’s Food Research Lab (JFRL) and Research Institutes and Centres at Osaka University. This helped participants to identify key areas for collaboration possibilities..