Dear BNC faculty, Two Colombia-US Research Institutes are in the planning stages to begin this Fall 2011 . This College of Engineering Initiative will focus on two interdisciplinary areas: on related to biotechnology and the other in Nanotechnology. The effort in nanotechnology is likely to focus on biodiversity, forest product nanotechnology, nanomedicine, energy, materials and electronics. This engagement opportunity, once details are agreed upon by both Colombia and Purdue, will provide roughly 30 fully funded doctoral students in the above nanotechnology research areas. These students are competitively selected from the best research institutions in Colombia by two funding agencies; Colfuturo, a privately funded foundation, and Colciencias, a government funding agency similar to NSF. A second leg of this engagement effort is to seek funding for workshops/symposia to enhance the research collaboration between the participating faculty from Colombia and Purdue. This program will advance in stages as we discuss and finalize the details with the funding agencies. However we would like to identify faculty in the nanotechnology research areas as soon as possible. Therefore if you are interested in learning more about this opportunity and learning how you can be a critical member of this global collaboration please contact me as soon as possible. Arvind Raman and I are working together to develop this program and we'd like to identify interested faculty by October 1, 2010. Best regards, ~ Monica M. Cortez Allain, Ph.D. ~ ************************************************************ Monica M. Cortez Allain, Ph.D. Managing Director Birck Nanotechnology Center 1205 W. State Street West Lafayette, IN 47907-2057 Phone: (765) 494-5138 Fax: (765) 496-8299 ************************************************************