Newsletter 6/2010

First Frontiers of Research Symposium in Brazil

The first interdisciplinary “Brazilian-German Frontiers of Science and Technology Symposium 2010” brought together young engineers and natural scientists in Bento Gonçalves, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil.

Brazilian-German Frontiers of Science and Technology Symposium 2010

60 junior researchers from Germany and Brazil met up in September at the invitation of the Humboldt Foundation. During their bi-national, interdisciplinary dialogue they shared ideas on the most recent developments in their research fields and discussed topics of future relevance.

The conference marked the launch of a series of “Brazilian-German Frontiers of Science and Technology Symposia”. The aim is to address Brazilian junior researchers who have so far had little or no contact to the Humboldt Foundation or the German research landscape in general and give them an opportunity to familiarise themselves with the quality of German research and the focus of current research issues. Quite apart from the specialist aspect, symposia of this kind initiate far-reaching contacts and lay the foundations for future collaborations between Germany and Brazil.

The symposium was integrated in the German-Brazilian Year of Science and was funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research. The Humboldt Foundation organised this initial Frontiers of Research Symposium in Brazil in cooperation with the Brazilian partner CAPES (Brazilian Federal Agency for Support and Evaluation of Graduate Education).

In China, India, Israel, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States these future-oriented scientific Frontiers of Research symposia for engineers, natural scientists and humanities scholars are already firmly established.