The Dutch Polymer Institute (DPI) and Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) are going to cooperate with the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development of Brazil. This week the knowledge institutes DPI and TU/e and the Brazilian Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) signed an agreement to this effect. The signing of the Letter of Understanding heralds the commencement of a three-year R&D cooperation in the area of nanotechnology and (bio-)polymers. It has been agreed that ten PhD candidates will be appointed.
The chief goal of the cooperation between Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e), the Dutch Polymer Institute (DPI) and the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development of Brazil (CNPq) is to set up a network to make better use of each other‟s strengths and to further develop these strengths. For this purpose joint research projects will be set up in the areas referred to. The transfer of knowledge and experience will be stimulated through the exchange of ten PhDs (doctoral candidates). There will be five researchers from Brazil, three from the DPI and two from TU/e. Six of the them will join the DPI-programme and four of them will join the TU/e-programme. If the evaluation to be made in two years shows that this cooperation is successful, the numbers will be doubled to a total of twenty doctoral candidates.
Dr. Jacques Joosten, Managing Director DPI, radiates enthusiasm about the cooperation between DPI, TU/e and Brazil. "We want to turn the DPI into an „International Centre of Excellence in Polymers‟. To that end we are expanding our network, focusing in particular on rapidly growing economies such as Brazil and China. This cooperation with the Brazilian Council for Scientific and Technological Development provides ample opportunities to enter into more alliances with Latin-American parties in the future. The way of working with both industry and university as DPI does is new to the Brazilian party". TU/e, too, sees opportunities for more joint ventures, particularly so because Biobased Materials is an area of special focus in the TU/e Department of Chemical Engineering and Chemistry.