Bangkok--22 Jun--BIOTEC
The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC), a UK-Government-research-funding body, the Thailand Research Fund (TRF) and the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) today signed an MOU to support research collaboration and human resource development in the field of biotechnology and biological sciences.
This MOU represents another milestone on progress with the ‘UK-Thailand Partners in Science’ program, formalised in September 2009 by the UK Government Chief Scientific Adviser and the President of National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) of Thailand. In February 2010, BBSRC organized a fact finding mission to Thailand to explore and identify potential areas of collaboration. Three topics were identified with high potential: zoonoses and food borne diseases, crop sequencing and novel biological natural products, and these became the priority in this MOU.
Present at the signing ceremony were Dr. Kanyawim Kirtikara, Executive Director of the National Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology (BIOTEC), one of the NSTDA research centers which will execute the MOU on behalf of NSTDA, Prof. Dr. Sawasd Tantararatana, TRF Director and Asif Ahmad, British Ambassador to Thailand, who represented BBSRC.
British Ambassador Asif Ahmad said, “The MOU signing today is a demonstration of the deep links between Thailand and the UK. As part of the UK-Thailand Partners in Science program, this MOU provides for new collaboration between the UK and Thailand in biosciences. BBSRC is investing ?675,000 to complement the Royal Golden Jubilee PhD Programme that has been successfully running in Thailand. This will enable 40 of Thailand’s most promising student scientists to study in the UK for one year of their PhD over the next 5 years. This will help in the exchange of knowledge between our two countries and the development of skills for a new generation of scientists. In the long term, BBSRC hopes that these students will forge new international collaborations with the people they meet during their stay”
Prof. Dr. Sawasd Tantararatana said, “It has been well documented that successful research programs usually have to be multidisciplinary in nature and require extensive collaboration among researchers. The multidisciplinary and collaborative research programs can be achieved though effective operation of research networks. The Royal Golden Jubilee (RGJ) Ph.D. program has involved more than 1,400 Thai advisors and more than 2,500 international co-advisors in 40 different countries. The RGJ-Ph.D. program is known for its high standard achievements due mainly through the selections of high quality students and supervisors. One of the most striking achievements through this program has been the success in continuing research collaborations and formation of research networks among Thai and overseas scientists, a new program named International Research Network (IRN) has been initiated based on the successful achievements of RGJ-Ph.D. program. Each IRN is composed of a group of Thai researchers working in collaboration with group of overseas researchers on a very focused research topic. Once an IRN is established, the RGJ-Ph.D. program awards five Ph.D. fellowships per year for a period of five years to the network. Additional research supports such as research grants, post doctoral fellowships, and others for the IRN can be sought from other research funding sources. Such long lasting collaboration through the IRN’s will ensure the sustainability of the research programs and research achievements. So this MOU will be the beginning of a mechanism for forming the IRN as well as a long fruitful cooperation between UK and Thailand.”
Dr. Kanyawim Kirtikara said, “to forge the collaboration, a series of workshops and meetings were organized throughout the first half of 2011, bringing in UK scientists to meet with Thai counterparts on each specific theme.” These meetings resulted in the formation of two UK-Thailand networks, one on food borne pathogens and the other on natural products. The UK-Thailand network on food borne pathogens currently has one research project on microbial risk assessment of Campylobacter in broiler chicken production chain in Thailand with participation from Chulalongkorn University, Khon Kaen University, King Mongkut\'s University of Technology Thonburi (KMUTT), BIOTEC and the University of Liverpool. The network on natural products has currently reached an agreement on one joint project on a type of insect pathogenic fungi, Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, consisting of partners including BIOTEC, the Genome Analysis Centre (TGAC) and the University of Bristol. “Both research projects have been approved for funding from NSTDA and BIOTEC, respectively,” added Dr. Kanyawim Kirtikara.
In addition to research, both networks of natural products and food borne pathogens also include a capacity building component, through the provision of PhD scholarships for Thai researchers to be jointly funded by the Thailand Research Fund and the UK’s Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).
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