India and UK to work as R&D partners in solar alliance and nanomaterials research
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‘lightweighting,’ materials for energy, energy generation and storage,” she adds. Innovate UK sees its gentle nudging toward particular topics as part of its remit to encourage developments in areas that it sees as of growing importance to the UK’s economy. “There is still huge value for us as thought leaders to recognize key strategic areas for the UK and to move forward,” says Webster. “That is something we will still be doing,” she adds. “However, we recognize that for businesses if they have got a new idea, if they have to wait for the right competition to come along, either in the right technical area or in the right size for what they wanted to do, that is not particularly helpful for them.” While the emphasis of Innovate UK is funding projects through competitions, it also works alongside and funds Knowledge Transfer Networks (KTNs). Among other things, the Materials KTN helps to organize briefing events for competitions. Through its groups, it also acts as a broker, bringing companies and research organizations together to form
India and UK to work as R&D partners in solar alliance and nanomaterials research
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t the 5th Indo-UK Science and Innovation Council Meeting (SIC) held in London in June, the two countries agreed on collaboration in a number of projects, including areas in solar energy and nanomaterials. The meeting was cochaired by India’s Minister for Science & Technology and Earth Sciences (DST), Harsh Vardhan, and the UK Minister for Universities & Science, Jo Johnson. As part of their commitment to the solar alliance, the research projects will focus on systems-level design and development covering solar energy generation, storage systems, and grid integration, particularly for microgrid systems. Furthermore, researchers from India will have access to the neutron scattering facility of the UK’s Science
and Technology Facilities Council at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Oxford. This will help to enhance Indian capability to fabricate structures at the nanoscale level for creating interesting and technologically important materials through research in fundamental science. The SIC oversees the entire gamut of the India-UK science, technology, and innovation cooperation and meets once every two years. The last meeting of the SIC was held in New Delhi in November 2014, at which time the two countries launched the Newton-Bhabha Program to support bilateral science and technology (S&T) cooperation. Both nations have now agreed to address grand societal challenges on food, energy, and water security; health and well-being; and smart cities and rapid urbanization
project consortia. “For people who want to find project partners,” says Webster, “they can contact the Knowledge Transfer Network, which has thousands of contacts and is very good at doing that kind of matchmaking.” Innovate UK also provides core funding for a series of Catapults. These describe themselves as “a network of world-leading centers designed to transform the UK’s capability for innovation in specific areas and help drive future e
