His Excellency Mr. Sanjay Kumar Varma, Ambassador of India as a representative of the Department of Science and Technology (DST), and Dr. Nobuhiro Kosugi, Director of Institute of Material Structure Science (IMSS) at KEK, signed the official document in a ceremony on Tuesday, 23 March, 2021.
DST and IMSS have been collaborating on the scientific and technological cooperation on a beamline at the Photon Factory in KEK since October, 2008. This is the third extension of the memorandum of understanding (MoU).
Dr. Pinku Saha, Indian Beamline Scientist staying at KEK, gave us a presentation of our long history and current status report. Mr. Gouranga Manna, who was also stationed as Indian Beamline Scientist and Dr. Nobumasa Funamori, Head of Photon Factory guided guests to the experimental hall.
His Excellency Mr. Sanjay Kumar Varma was interested in how the beam time for the experiments is allocated to the selected proposals and delivered a congratulatory address of our successful collaboration.
The signing ceremony was held in-person with Ms. Fumie Hara, Senior Specialist for International Research Coordination, International Science and Technology Affairs Division and Ms. Aya Kontani, Administrative Researcher, International Science and Technology Affairs Division as representatives of MEXT.
It was also live-streamed so that Indian researchers in India could join the ceremony.
We hope it helps to build a stronger relationship between both countries while promoting further research activities.
