The leading Sino-US joint-venture university in China wants to attract more international students and will begin accepting applications this month for its new undergraduate degree program for fall 2018.

Close to Shanghai and in the heart of the Yangtze River Delta region, China's major economic hub, Duke Kunshan University is a collaborative venture between Duke University, which is consistently ranked among the top 10 universities in the United States, and Wuhan University in China.

Duke Kunshan University is "committed to bringing together a diverse cohort of high-quality students from across the world", said Denis Simon, its executive vice-chancellor.

The university, located in Kunshan in East China's Jiangsu province, is seeking to recruit a class of 225 students, including at least 50 from overseas. The university has previously offered only postgraduate courses and a non-degree undergraduate program called the Global Learning Semester.

Following its rapid economic growth over the past four decades, China has become a popular destination for international students.

A total of 442,773 international students went to China to study in 2016, according to statistics from the Ministry of Education. Jiangsu is the third-largest destination for foreign students, behind Beijing and Shanghai.

Russell Davis, director of global student recruitment at Duke Kunshan, said the university provides students with a unique opportunity to live and study in China and the US while pursuing a world-class education and degrees from both Duke and Duke Kunshan.

"Students will study in a truly global environment. The undergraduate academic program spans two continents - in Kunshan, at a state-of-the-art campus; and a two-semester experience at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina," David said, adding that non-Chinese students will be required to learn Mandarin.

Davis said Duke Kunshan will steadily increase the class size in the years ahead. At full capacity, Duke Kunshan will have 2,000 undergraduate students with a mix of 60 percent Chinese from the mainland and 40 percent from other regions of the world.

chenyingqun@chinadaily.com.cn