Canon Medical and The First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University Launch Medical Imaging AI Innovation Center
Canon Medical China R&D Center and the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University have officially launched a Medical Imaging AI Innovation Center in Zhengzhou city, Henan province, marking the first imaging-focused AI collaboration platform in central China. The center is designed to advance AI technology development, clinical translation, and research commercialization in medical imaging.
The first project will focus on gastric cancer, addressing key clinical challenges, including lesion detection, tumor staging, and assessment of lymph node metastasis. The collaboration aims to develop a gastric imaging AI solution tailored to Chinese patients, with plans to establish standardized databases, conduct research, develop AI models, support clinical implementation, and contribute to industry consensus.
Gastric cancer remains a leading cause of cancer death globally, with particularly high incidence in East Asia. In China, the overall five-year survival rate is only 35.1%, and more than 70% of patients are diagnosed at advanced stages. While gastroscopy with biopsy is the gold standard for diagnosis, its invasive nature, cost, and limited ability to assess tumor invasion and lymph node status create significant barriers to widespread screening and comprehensive evaluation. Abdominal CT is an important tool for preoperative assessment and postoperative follow-up, but accurate interpretation is challenging due to the complex anatomy of the stomach, variability in image quality, and heavy reliance on physician experience.
The hospital’s radiology department has more than 30 years of experience in gastric imaging and has accumulated thousands of high-quality gastric cancer cases through standardized digital data management since 2011. Professor Gao Jianbo, chief expert of the department, noted that the collaboration aims to develop practical AI tools that can help clinicians achieve faster and more accurate early detection, efficacy prediction, and treatment assessment.
The Canon Medical China R&D Center has established a strong AI technology foundation, with nearly 400 international patents filed and multiple AI applications developed for global clinical settings. The center’s AI research platform, Air Plugin, has already been deployed at the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University and several other major Chinese hospitals. The platform features more than 40 AI-based segmentation algorithms for organs and lesions, providing robust support for clinical research. This technical foundation and deployment experience provide a solid base for the joint development of gastric imaging AI solutions.
Xiao Qilin, Director of the Canon Medical China R&D Center, emphasized that the company’s AI development is grounded in local clinical needs rather than simply adapting overseas solutions, and the collaboration with the hospital represents an important step in this strategy.
Beyond gastric imaging, the center will also explore applications in neurovascular diseases, leveraging the hospital’s role as a national neurological disease regional medical center. Through the hospital’s established seven-level telemedicine network, the AI tools developed are expected to be disseminated to a broader range of healthcare facilities, helping standardize gastric cancer diagnosis and improve early detection capabilities across the region. The collaboration builds on a relationship dating back to the 1990s and is part of a broader effort to advance precision imaging and intelligent healthcare in China.
