Forbes Asia Names 18 Researchers and Founders to 2026 30 Under 30 Healthcare and Science List

Forbes Asia published its 2026 30 Under 30 list for the Healthcare & Science category on May 27. The list names 18 researchers and founders whose projects range from genetic-material studies to medical-device startups. D. from Nagoya University in 2025, now works at the Institute of Science Tokyo.

She studies xeno-nucleic acid, a synthetic molecule more resistant to enzymes than DNA or RNA, as a possible route to understanding the origins of life. Okita previously won the Nagoya University 3 Minute Thesis Competition in 2024 and the L’Oréal-UNESCO for Women in Science Japan Fellowship in 2025.

She stated that replicating early life forms remains a central goal of her work.

Zhengwu, 29, is an assistant professor at the University of Hong Kong. His laboratory focuses on decoding brain signals for potential use in mind-controlled external devices. D. in electrical engineering at Tsinghua University and has more than 1,700 citations across papers in Nature Communications, Nature Electronics, and Science Advances.

He also advises the World Telehealth Initiative, a nonprofit that provides remote medical services.

Wenxuan, assistant professor at the Singapore University of Technology and Design, leads development of SeaLLMs, a set of large language models for Indonesian, Thai, and Vietnamese. He appeared on Stanford’s 2025 list of the world’s top 2 percent of scientists.

Sean Du, assistant professor at Nanyang Technological University, directs the RADIO lab, which studies methods to limit errors in AI outputs. Shi Weijia, an incoming assistant professor at Cornell University, previously led the FlexOlmo project at the Allen Institute for AI.

That project examined ways for data owners to control when their information is used in model training. Shi received an outstanding paper award from the Association for Computational Linguistics in 2024.

Tsai co-founded Aztron Medtech in Taiwan in 2021.

The company’s device performs tendon repair through incisions of one centimeter or less and has been used in 100 procedures in the United States as of February. Lakshay Sahni and Ramya Yellapragada started Marbles Health in India in 2020. Their EASE headset delivers low-level electrical stimulation and is deployed in more than 75 hospitals and clinics.

Aman Kumar, Dhawal Jain, and Jai Sharma founded Mave Health in Bangalore in late 2023. The company’s $495 wearable stimulates the prefrontal cortex and raised $2.1 million in seed funding in March.

Nakahara, Ma Shaoang, and Rentaro Nomura established medimo in Japan in 2022. The platform converts spoken clinical notes into structured electronic records using medical-specific AI training. Keoki Alexander-Chang founded Minikai in Australia in 2024 to develop workflow software for medical offices.