Taiwan and Japan are advancing bilateral scientific cooperation with applications in the areas of green materials, new drug development and semiconductors under a pact renewed June 12 in northern Taiwan’s Hsinchu City.
The MOU was signed by representatives of Taiwan’s National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center under the Ministry of Science and Technology, Japan Synchrotron Radiation Research Institute and RIKEN—the northeast Asian country’s leading research organization.
According to the MOST, the pact enables NSRRC to boost Taiwan’s leading-edge technology and R&D fundamentals pertaining to synchrotron radiation. This includes light of various wavelengths like infrared, visible, ultraviolet and X-rays.
It is anticipated the agreement will also sow the seeds for greater innovation and more collaborative studies capitalizing on the respective strengths of NSRRC, JASRI and RIKEN, the ministry said.
NSRRC’s relationship with JASRI commenced in 2000. This took the form of an NT$350 million (US$ 11.6 million) commitment to designing and constructing two beamlines at Super Photon ring-8 GeV, or SPRING-8, the world’s largest 3G synchrotron radiation facility developed by JASRI and RIKEN in Hyogo prefecture.
Other examples of Taiwan-Japan scientific cooperation include around 200 academics and university students from Taiwan visiting Spring-8 for beamline research, as well as talents from both countries jointly publishing more than 550 Science Citation Index journals over the past 20 years.
NSRRC is a nonprofit research institute based in northern Taiwan’s Hsinchu Science Park. It is the biggest synchrotron facility in the country, and operates two accelerators: Taiwan Light and Photon Source. (TYT-E)
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