
Peer-Reviewed Study in Nature Scientific Reports Demonstrates Non-Invasive Fat Reduction Using Alma's Energy-Based Technology
Conducted at Ewha Womans University Seoul Hospital by Dr. Yeo Ju Sohn and Dr. Hyejin Chun of the Department of Family Medicine at Ewha Womans University College of Medicine, the research confirmed measurable fat layer reduction through ultrasound imaging and waist circumference assessments. Patients reported high satisfaction and consistently strong tolerance throughout the treatment protocol, with no adverse events observed.
This publication comes at a time when abdominal obesity is increasingly recognized as a key contributor to cardiovascular disease and metabolic syndrome, both in South Korea and globally. According to the World Health Organization, more than 1 billion people worldwide are living with obesity—a major risk factor for type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and premature mortality. As obesity rates continue to rise, so does the urgency for safe, effective, and accessible treatment options beyond surgical intervention.
"This study highlights the evolving role of non-invasive modalities in body shaping and reinforces their potential significance in the broader context of health and wellness," said Lior Dayan, CEO of Alma. "This new publication strengthens the scientific foundation supporting Alma's technologies and showcases our commitment to advancing innovation that prioritizes patient safety, enhances the treatment experience, and keeps pace with the evolving needs of modern patients."
Accent Prime combines proprietary ultrasound and radiofrequency technologies to deliver personalized, non-invasive treatments for body contouring, skin tightening, and facial rejuvenation. The platform is CE marked and approved for the treatment of various different indications, including facial and body contouring, skin tightening, cellulite reduction, and skin rejuvenation. Widely adopted by leading clinics worldwide, Accent Prime offers flexible, combination-based protocols that support tailored treatment strategies across diverse skin types and body areas—without the need for surgery or downtime. These proprietary ultrasound and radiofrequency technologies have also been clinically validated in other products from Alma's Body Contouring series, such as Alma PrimeX.
Alma is a global leader in medical aesthetic solutions, with over 25 years of innovation. We empower practitioners to deliver safe, effective, and life-transforming treatments to their patients, utilizing state-of-the-art, clinically proven solutions such as energy-based device lasers, diagnostics, injectables, and advanced skincare. Alma's multiple award-winning products have set a new benchmark in the medical aesthetic industry, both in terms of clinical excellence and groundbreaking innovations.
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Korea Herald
2 days ago
- Korea Herald
Stone in Yunfu: carving timeless beauty through centuries of craftsmanship
GUANGZHOU, China, Aug. 14, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- News report from GDToday. Yunfu, a city in Guangdong Province known as the "Capital of Stone in China," shines as a radiant pearl in the Lingnan region. Every piece of stone here bears the mark of time. With a legacy spanning over four centuries, Yunfu fuses the raw artistry of nature with the brilliance of human craftsmanship, creating a stone culture that has captivated the world. Yunfu is home to a diverse collection of stone, resembling nature's grand palette and showcasing the "essence of global geological evolution". It boasts over a thousand varieties of stone, including marble, granite, and limestone, alongside internationally renowned stones such as Blue Jade from Africa, Crystal from Italy, Snow Mountain Blue, Pandora, Golden Peacock, and Crystal Blue from Brazil. As "China's Stone Circulation Demonstration Base" and "China's Capital of Artificial Stone," Yunfu hosts the annual International Stone Materials Science and Tech Fair and Stone Culture Week, drawing merchants from around the globe and living up to its promise of "global sourcing and global sales." Yunfu hosts China's largest stone industry cluster, with over 4,000 enterprises stretching along the famed "Hundred-Mile Stone Materials Corridor" and 200,000 skilled professionals driving innovation. The simultaneous advancement of eco-friendly production and digital transformation has infused traditional industries with green vitality in the modern era. Today, Yunfu connects with the world through stone. From monumental architectural visions to elegant touches in home design, the stone in Yunfu, carved with centuries of craftsmanship and infused with the spirit of nature, continues to create timeless masterpieces for the global stage. The 22nd Yunfu International Stone Materials Sci-Tech Fair and the 16th Yunfu Stone Cultural Week will be held from October 18 to 21, 2025, at Hall A of the Yunfu International Stone Materials Expo Center at Hekou Subdistrict, Yuncheng District, Yunfu City. This year, the event will feature stone pavilions of fine stone products showcased by stone enterprises. We sincerely invite fellow professionals, designers, and distinguished guests from around the world in the stone industry to participate as exhibitors or visitors. Scan the QR codes to discover more about Yunfu's stone industry.
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Korea Herald
3 days ago
- Korea Herald
[Inside K-AI] How benchmarks shape AI battlefield -- and where Korea's models stand
Standardized tests offer reality check, separating marketing buzz from genuine AI performance The race for sovereign AI is intensifying, with countries rushing to build their own large language models to secure technological independence. Korea is no exception -- the government has tapped five leading companies to spearhead the creation of homegrown models tailored to national priorities. In this high-stakes contest, The Korea Herald launches a special series exploring Korea's AI industry and its standing in the global arena, and the rise of Korean-language-focused systems. This first installment looks at benchmarks -- the scorecards of the AI world -- and how Korean models measure up on the tests that are shaping the race. – Ed. AI has swept across the tech industry, powering chatbots, search engines and productivity tools. OpenAI's ChatGPT -- which first ignited the global buzz in November 2022 -- and other big tech models sit firmly in the top tier, but the surge of large language models shows no sign of slowing. Each new arrival is touted as the smartest or the first of its kind, outscoring the rest. That raises a key question: how are these models really evaluated, and which is the true leader? The answer lies in benchmarks -- the standardized tests that have become the AI world's scoreboard, where companies race to climb the rankings and prove their worth. In July, South Korea's Upstage pulled off an unexpected breakthrough when its 31-billion-parameter Solar Pro 2 became the only Korean model listed as a "frontier model" by UK-based benchmarking platform Artificial Analysis. It ranked just outside the global top 10 for intelligence and placed first in Intelligence vs. Cost to Run, a measure of how much capability a model delivers for its operating cost. The result prompted swift reaction from Elon Musk, whose AI company xAI is also a relative newcomer battling entrenched leaders. In a post on X, he insisted his Grok 4 model "remains No. 1" and is "rapidly improving" -- a pointed defense that reflects how sensitive and strategic leaderboard positions have become in the global AI race. Launching its latest GPT-5 model last week, OpenAI also promoted the model as "much smarter" than earlier ones and cited scores in several key benchmarks measuring performance in areas such as math, coding and visual perception. "For engineers, benchmarks serve as a barometer for how the LLM they developed fares in the global competition, and as a compass for its future development," an official of an LLM startup said. Constant race to set new records Much like human IQ tests or university entrance exams, the benchmarks offer a structured way to measure various capabilities, from language comprehension and reasoning to code generation, under the same conditions. When an LLM tops a benchmark, it is deemed State-of-the-Art (SOTA) for that task -- a title that can quickly change as new models are released. MMLU, which is one of the most widely used benchmarks, poses more than 15,000 multiple-choice questions across 57 subjects. HumanEval and LiveCodeBench test coding ability, while AIME and MATH-500 gauge mathematical reasoning. For instance, OpenAI boasted that its new GPT-5 achieved SOTA in math, scoring 94.6 percent on AIME 2025 without tools; in real-world coding, scoring 74.9 percent on SWE-bench Verified; and in multimodal understanding, achieving 84.2 percent on MMMU, among others. Korean LLM firms are also working fiercely to set new records. Releasing its most up-to-date model Exaone 4.0 on July 15, LG AI Research promoted its strong performance in advanced benchmarks. In MMLU-Pro, the 32-billion-parameter model scored 81.8 percent, ahead of Microsoft's Phi 4 reasoning-plus with 76 percent and Mistral's Magistral Small-2506 at 73.4 percent. In AIME 2025, it also outperformed those rivals with a score of 85.3 percent. As LLMs advance rapidly, the benchmarks themselves are also evolving. MMLU now offers a Pro edition with more complex reasoning questions. In January, a coalition of 1,000 experts launched Humanity's Last Exam -- a 2,500-question test spanning classical literature to quantum chemistry. But what often confuses the public is the endless list of scores. Experts note that because LLMs can do so many different things, each has its own strengths -- making it difficult to declare one model "the best" based on a single benchmark. To make sense of the growing number of benchmark results, platforms like Hugging Face provide leaderboards that compile scores from multiple tests and rank models accordingly. The Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index is another prominent one that aggregates results from eight advanced benchmarks -- including the MMLU-Pro, Humanity's Last Exam and AIME -- to produce an overall score. With strong scores across multiple benchmarks, LG's Exaone and Upstage's Solar Pro 2 were the only Korean LLMs to make the Artificial Analysis index in July. At the time of release, Exaone 4.0 ranked 11th globally in the Intelligence Index, standing shoulder to shoulder with big brands such as Google's Gemini, OpenAI's ChatGPT and Alibaba's Qwen. Upstage's Solar Pro 2 went a step further, becoming the only Korean model recognized in the leaderboard's Frontier Language Model Intelligence category -- reserved for the highest-performing systems at the cutting edge of research and development. It also topped the Intelligence vs. Cost to Run metric. 'It is fair to say Korean models are quite competitive, considering their rivals are often several times larger," an LG official said, explaining how models like Grok 4, which held the top spot in the July index, has a staggering 1.7 trillion parameters -- meaning it used far more resources in training to achieve the intelligence score. The list has since updated its benchmarks with more challenging tests and added newly released models such as GPT-5 -- which overtook Grok 4 for the top spot -- nudging the Korean models down slightly, though both remain in the global index. LG AI Research and Upstage have both been named among the government's five consortia tasked with leading the development of South Korea's proprietary AI foundation models, alongside Naver Cloud, SK Telecom and NC AI. Naver, which became the third company in the world to develop a hyperscale AI model with HyperClova in 2021, has since upgraded its foundation model and in June released HyperClova X Think. The company cites its model's strength in its deep understanding of the Korean language. Going beyond benchmarks The way benchmarks gain recognition is similar to how a new measurement scale in the social sciences becomes a standard. After being published in a peer-reviewed paper, it should be validated at a reputable academic conference and adopted by the global AI community, an industry official explained. As crowded as the AI field is becoming, with one LLM after another touting new benchmark scores, the results still serve an important purpose: they offer guidelines for engineers in measuring their progress. "Global big techs still lead, but players in countries like China, France and Korea are closing in, and the race is intense," an LG official said. "The presence of Korean companies on leaderboards and key benchmarks shows the country is not only catching up but is firmly in the game." At the same time, the rollout of GPT-5 shows that real-world user experiences are just as important as strong performances in advanced benchmark tests. Launched on August 7, the highly anticipated OpenAI model shot to the top in the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, but has faced backlash from users who claim it feels "downgraded," citing a blander personality and surprisingly basic mistakes. Lee Kyoung-jun, a big data analytics professor at Kyung Hee University, stressed that the true measure of an LLM's competitiveness lies in its practical utility. "Korean LLMs are making strides in benchmarks, but it's important to note that even major models like Exaone are having little impact on the general public for now," Lee said. "Efforts must continue to ensure these excellent models are adopted in real use cases and achieve widespread adoption." herim@


Korea Herald
3 days ago
- Korea Herald
Hospital Management Asia 2025: Shaping the Future of Asian Healthcare
HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam, Aug. 13, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Hospital Management Asia (HMA), the region's premier annual event for hospital management and healthcare, is set to officially take place at GEM Center, Ho Chi Minh City. This year's conference, organised by Clarion Events Pte Ltd, will gather over 100 speakers from 15 countries and territories, alongside hundreds of hospital leaders, medical professionals, and healthcare organizations from across the region and beyond. From Healthcare System Reform to Medical Tourism Under the theme "Quality, Experience & Leadership in Healthcare: Integrate – Inspire – Innovate," HMA 2025 aims to reaffirm core values in modern hospital governance: driving excellence in quality, enhancing patient experience, and fostering strong leadership. The conference officially opens on September 10, 2025, with remarks by Prof. Dr. Tran Van Thuan – Vice Minister of Health, Vietnam, alongside HMA organizing committee representatives. Over the two-day conference, delegates can expect to hear from world-leading experts, including: Dr Lisa Ishii, Senior Vice President (Operations), Johns Hopkins Health System, USA, who will speak on how hospital leadership can be shaped by lessons from the past and innovations in the future. Sasa Mutic – President of Radiation Oncology Solutions, who will be presenting ideas and innovations into accelerating cancer survivorship journeys. There will also be more than 20 in-depth discussion sessions focusing on the three main pillars of: 1. Quality and Safety: infection prevention, AI in diagnosis & treatment, EHR, clinical decision-making; 2. Patient and Staff Experience: healthcare service design, PREMs/PROMs, staff well-being; and 3. Leadership and Organizational Models: Hospital-at-Home, DRG vs FFS business models, ESG, succession strategies, Value-Based Care. Some prominent topics at the conference include medical tourism, a sector where Thailand has established itself as a global leader and economic powerhouse. Leading institutions such as Bumrungrad International Hospital have established Thailand's reputation for excellence, with Artirat Charukitpipat, CEO, Bumrungrad International Hospital, presenting a case study on how the hospital maintains rigorous international accreditation standards while delivering comprehensive medical services. Hospitals also grapple with the ongoing challenges of resource optimization and staff wellbeing while maintaining exceptional patient outcomes. Dr Saran Intakul, Deputy Hospital Director, Samitivej Srinakarin Hospital, will be presenting a compelling case study drawing from real-world experience including his team's exemplary response to the 2024 Singapore Airlines SQ321 turbulence incident that led to an influx of patients to the hospital, demonstrating how strategic workflow preparation and connected care systems enable healthcare facilities to efficiently manage mass-casualty events. Celebrating Innovation and Connecting Practice A notable highlight at HMA 2025 will be two highly anticipated panel sessions on each day of the conference. The " DRG Debate" session will see experts from Malaysia and Thailand's health ministries and associations exchanging opinions in a fiery discussion over the dilemma on whether the Diagnosis-Related Group or Fee-For-Service business model is better-suited to deliver both cost containment and quality care in Southeast Asia's diverse healthcare markets. Meanwhile, the " Vietnam Four" panel session will bring together representatives from four exemplary hospital systems in Vietnam: Hoa Lam Group, FV Hospital, Vinmec International Healthcare System, and Hoan My Medical Corporation. Here, these representatives will share practical experiences and strategies for developing effective hospital models. HMA 2025 wraps up with its highly-anticipated Gala Dinner and the HMA Awards 2025 ceremony, honoring outstanding innovations in hospital management across Asia. Award-winning organizations are recognized as exemplary models of innovation throughout the region. The organizing committee encourages guests to wear traditional national attire, celebrating Asian cultural diversity and fostering multinational connections. Following the main event, on September 12, international delegates will participate in a field visit program to leading hospitals in Ho Chi Minh City: FV Hospital, Gia An 115, City International Hospital, and Tam Anh Hospital. This provides an opportunity for international delegates to directly experience the operational models, treatment protocols, and innovative strategies being implemented in Vietnam. HMA 2025 promises to be a forum for knowledge sharing, professional networking, and creating solutions for the future of Asian healthcare. For more information, please contact: