The establishment of National Yang-Ming University, formerly known as National Yang-Ming College of Medicine, was approved by Taiwan’s Executive Yuan in January 1971. It was named after the Ming dynasty Chinese philosopher Wang Yang-Ming. Three years later, the construction of the college’s first building—the Experimental Building—was completed. The college was officially founded on May 15, 1975, when Dr. Paul Han was appointed its first Provost. Its first class of 120 medical students enrolled in July of the same year. Since the college lacked its own hospital, the Executive Yuan approved Taipei Veterans General Hospital to serve as the college’s teaching hospital. Adhering to the college motto of “benevolent mind and art, putting knowledge into practice,” the college initially dedicated itself to training doctors to serve the needs of Taiwan, especially regarding the shortage of medical resources faced by Taiwan’s rural areas. The first class of students graduated in 1982 and were sent to serve in public clinics and hospitals throughout Taiwan.

In July 1994, National Yang-Ming College of Medicine became National Yang-Ming University (NYMU), which was the first medicine-oriented university in Taiwan, and Dr. Shao-Hua Han became its first President. Over time, NYMU built upon its strengths in medicine while expanding its focus to the biomedical sciences more generally. The original College of Medicine was eventually joined by six other colleges: the College of Biomedical Science and Engineering (1994), the College of Life Sciences (1994), the College of Nursing (1996), the College of Dentistry (2000), the College of Humanities and Social Sciences (2008), and the College of Pharmaceutical Sciences (2015). By the 2016 academic year, NYMU had 11 undergraduate programs, 34 master’s programs, and 28 Ph.D. programs, as well as more than 20 research centers.

In December 2018, National Yang-Ming University and National Chiao Tung University began to negotiate on merging with one another. With the idea that interdisciplinary collaboration solves real-world problems, the two universities merged on February 1, 2021, to become National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU).