NSF and EC establish collaboration opportunities for early career scientists
- PDF / 147,236 Bytes
- 1 Pages / 585 x 783 pts Page_size
- 14 Downloads / 171 Views
ocess of starting such mining operations is likely to be slow: “From exploration until setting up an extraction plant may take more than 10 years.” Despite its latest efforts, however, India is unlikely to challenge China in its dominance over the global supply of rare earths, according to Naresh Pant, associate geology professor at the University of Delhi. “That would require at least an order of magnitude increase in production,” he said. India’s rare-earth reserves stand at just more than three million tons, he said, while China has more than 36 million. At the moment, the lack of rare-earth deposits in the European Union means that it imports USD$458 million of rare
earths annually from China. According to the US Department of the Interior, the United States has around 13% of global reserves of rare earths, Russia has 17%, and Australia has 1.5%, yet all these nations depend on imports, too. Complaints to the World Trade Organization have focused on the fact that China—which has around 37% of reserves and supplies around 97% of the world’s rare-earth elements—is threatening businesses by restricting exports. For India, which also relies on Chinese rare earths, restarting rare-earths processing, mining, and exploration may at least offer a ray of hope as supply shortages begin to bite. Angela Saini
tween European and US researchers. European Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science Máire Geoghegan-Quinn and NSF Director Subra Suresh signed the arrangement on July 13 at the European Science Open Forum in Dublin.
NSF and EC establish collaboration opportunities for early career scientists
T
he US National Science Foundation (NSF) and the European Commission (EC) signed an Implementing Arrangement to provide opportunities for NSF-funded early career scientists and engineers to pursue research collabo-
rations with European colleagues supported through the European Research Council (ERC) awards. The agreement supports collaborations on specific projects while leveraging research funding and fostering lasting collaborations be-
National Space Administration (CNSA), Chen Qiufa, to discuss numerous topics, including the Bi-National Center for Nanotechnology and memorandums of understanding for biotechnology and meteorology centers.
Brazil and China discuss 10-year cooperation plan
D
uring the Rio+20 Summit held in June, Brazil and China signed the Ten-Year Cooperation Plan 2012–2021. In July, Brazil’s Minister of Science, Technology and Innovation (MCTI),
Marco Antonio Raupp, traveled to China to meet with the Chinese Ministers of Science and Technology, Wan Gang, and Industry and Information Technology, Miao Wei, and the head of the Chinese
be used to study the most precise nature of any biological and industrial material, it can be used by almost any industry across a wide range of research fields,” said Evans. The AUD$30 million government investment is being provided by the Australian Research Council (AUD$25 million) and National Health and Medical Research Council (AUD$5 million). □
Australia’
Data Loading...
