Professor Dr. Maznah Dahlui is a distinguished Public Health Physician and an Honorary Professor at the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Malaya. Her extensive career encompasses significant contributions to health economics, policy evaluation, and public health initiatives. Academic and Professional Background Dr. Dahlui began her career in 1989 with the Ministry of Health Malaysia, where she completed her Houseman-ship and Medical Officer trainings before advancing to the role of Deputy Director at the Food Safety and Quality Division. She later transitioned to the National Institutes of Health, where she played a key role in training healthcare workers on research methodologies and professional ethics. In 2003, she joined the University of Malaya, where she has held several leadership positions, including Head of the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine (2011–2016) and Deputy Dean (Postgraduate) of the Faculty of Medicine (2016–2020). She was in UM senate for several years during those period. In 2022, up to now, she serves as the Head of the Department of Research Development and Innovation at the University Malaya Medical Centre. In this role, she coordinates research initiatives, promotes AI applications to enhance healthcare quality, and implements the Case-mix System as an effective mechanism for costing healthcare services and improving hospital management efficiency. Dr Maznah had served University Airlanga of Surabaya, Indonesia as a Visiting Professor from 2018 to 2024 and as an Adjunct Professor at Taylor's University, Malaysia since 2020 until today. Leadership in National Committees Her academic excellence and leadership have been recognized through her election as a Fellow of the Academy of Science Malaysia, Fellow of the Public Health Medicine Association, Fellow of Medicine and Distinguished Fellow of Royal College Physicians, UK (Public Health). Dr. Dahlui's expertise has been instrumental in shaping national health policies and programs. She has served as the Chair of the National Clearinghouse for Adolescent Health in Malaysia, reflecting her commitment to improving youth health services. Additionally, she has been a key member of the Technical Advisory Committee of Health Technology Economic Evaluation (TACHTEE) since 2015, providing guidance on the economic assessment of health technologies. In 2024, she has been appointed to chair the National Committee to develop a national grouper as a mechanism for provider payment in healthcare. This initiative is a crucial step in improving efficiency and equity in Malaysia’s healthcare financing. Contributions to Public Health and Healthcare Reform Throughout her career, Dr. Dahlui has been actively involved in evaluating and monitoring national health strategies, including the National Strategic Planning of HIV/AIDS. Her collaborations with international organizations such as UNFPA, UNESCO, the World Bank, and WHO have led to several consultancy projects focused on the evaluation and monitoring of health programs. Her research interests extend to cancer screening, infectious diseases (HIV and Hepatitis C), mental health, and obesity prevention, where she applies economic evaluation approaches to enhance health policy decision-making. She serves as the Vice President (Administration) of the Asia-Pacific Academic Consortium for Public Health, a prestigious international association dedicated to advancing public health education and training to strengthen the competencies of practitioners across the region. Dr. Dahlui is a strong advocate for the implementation of social health insurance (SHI) as a key reform in Malaysia’s healthcare financing. She argues that SHI is essential for ensuring equity in health access and sustaining the healthcare system in the long run. By promoting a structured and sustainable financial model, she aims to address the challenges of rising healthcare costs while ensuring that all Malaysians receive quality healthcare services. In summary, Professor Dr. Maznah Dahlui's leadership in public health is marked by her strategic roles in national committees, her dedication to health economics, and her commitment to healthcare reform to ensure sustainability and equity in Malaysia’s health system.

Started his research career in the think tank sector, Dr. Lee Chee Leong (Karl) is attracted to the rise of non-traditional diplomacy in the international order today. Such appeal has taken Dr. Lee into new research horizons that started with his Monash University's doctoral research on the Chinese sub-state diplomacy in China-ASEAN economic cooperation. With constructive supervision by Professor Helen Nesadurai and Associate Professor Kuik Cheng Chwee, Dr. Lee completed his doctoral thesis that unravels how a faraway and least developed sub-state of Guangxi managed to overcome its own hurdles, navigate the complexities within the Chinese state and become the frontline actor in China-ASEAN economic cooperation. Following his doctoral completion, Dr. Lee's research on non-traditional diplomacy has expanded into Taiwan’s quasi-state diplomacy in Southeast Asia. Such quest has led him spending at great length in comprehending the concept of soft power, a concept that finds its relevance to Taiwan, which has no official diplomatic with Southeast Asia but is heavily connected to the region and has to rely on soft power in its engagements with these Southeast Asian nations. Taking Malaysia as the first case study of Taiwan's soft power in the region, Dr. Lee is developing the third intervening variable correlating both Taiwanese soft power resources and outcomes, in his course of providing a dynamical explanation for such phenomenon. For the coming years, his research focus and publications will be on the different areas featuring Taiwan-Malaysia and Taiwan-Southeast Asia cooperation such as digital social innovation (DSI) for climate change, industry-based education/training programmes, smart cities, tourism, digital democracy, agriculture, public health and medicine, ornamental aquaculture and aquascape. To date, Dr. Lee was the recipient of several scholarships and fellowships in Malaysia and overseas: University of Malaya’s Graduate Fellowship (2010-2011); Monash University’s Merit Scholarship (2016-2019); Chinese Government Scholarship (2018-2019); and Taiwan Fellowship (2020). Prior to his appointment as Senior Lecturer at the Institute of China Studies (ICS), he was the Visiting Scholar at Guangxi University for Nationalities (GXUN) (2018-10992019), Taiwan Fellow at National Chengchi University (NCCU) (2020) and Associate Fellow at ICS UM (2016-2019).He welcomes any potential PhD candidate who would like to work on Taiwan-Southeast Asia relations, Taiwan's soft power in Southeast Asia and Taiwan-Malaysia DSI cooperation for climate change. He is also willing to discuss with potential doctoral candidates on proposals related to the Chinese sub-state (provincial) diplomacy toward ASEAN, China's soft power in ASEAN, Southeast Asian sub-state diplomacy, comparative cases of sub-state diplomacy around the world and conceptual innovation of sub-state diplomacy as well as soft power. 

Sarel developed an interest in e-learning in 2004 when he volunteered as a participant in a public university’s e-learning project. Leveraging his background in software engineering—a bachelor's degree in computer science with a major in software engineering—he began exploring the design and integration of e-learning with educational concepts and technical functionalities to enhance student learning opportunities. His first official e-learning initiative, diskusiMAYA (accessible at www.diskusimaya.com), was primarily designed to support his part-time students since 2006. Additionally, he conceptualized and developed an innovative e-learning environment tailored for selected teachers as part of the MAYA project, accessible via maya.ilusikreatif.com and maya.sorient.my. His approach incorporates diverse instructional design strategies, including online learning environments and blended learning methods, to sustain student engagement in the learning process. Sarel has also contributed to the development of a virtual learning environment platform for a private university, focusing on how virtual environments function as collaborative spaces to enhance students’ learning experiences. Now, he emphasizes the importance of experience in practicing digital skills in education as a transition to AI Literacy. At the same time, he is an AI trainer in/for education who has produced several GPTs under the Scholar AI Project such as 'Scholar Proposal Mentor', 'Scholar Bloom's Digital Taxonomy', Scholar Intelligence Report, or 'Scholar UM Expert'. According to him, every engagement provided by the community (either lecturers or students) in the online environment is about building up motivation.