MICEMS Boost Visit of Polito's Delegation

Yesterday's event was the highlight of the week for me and the institute. Politecnico di Torino's Rector Prof. Marco Gilli made a visit to UPM and MICEMS' office at INSPEM. Prof. Gilli was accompanied by Prof. Riccardo Adami who was one of the speakers for EQuaLS8. The Italian Ambassador to Malaysia, His Excellency, Mr. Mario Sammartino also joined the Polito delegation to UPM, which was a pleasant surprise.

Here are the pics on their arrival at the Chancellory building. The delegation was received by Prof. Dr. Ing. Renuganth Varadarajoo, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Industry & Community Relations) and the INSPEM management.

Inside the Chancellory building, discussions before the arrival of the UPM Vice-Chancellor.

The arrival of Prof. Datin Paduka Dr. Aini Ideris and the discussions  and exchanges of documents and gifts with the Polito delegation.

Some group photos in the Chancellory building.

Arrival at INSPEM and MICEMS building.

Discussions in INSPEM meeting room and the group photo.

The visit to Muzium Warisan Melayu.

Now for some contents of the visit. At the Chancellory, there was a presentation of the Letter of Intent as an Addendum of the earlier MoU. We have now renewed commitment of INSPEM in supporting MICEMS and the forthcoming stationing of Polito's researcher in the MICEMS office in INSPEM. The Rector Prof. Gilli also stated the idea of expanding the collaboration further to include Engineering and Architecture for which Polito is well known for.

At INSPEM, the Director Prof. Noor Akma presented some information on the institute as well as the activities surrounding MICEMS. This is followed by some highlights of the research carried out with MICEMS. The Rector Prof. Gilli in the discussion told us some history of Politecnico di Torino which is known to be well connected to the industries (see Wikipedia article). Let me mention also here the famous Fiat car industry is based in Turin and the name Fiat comes from Fabbrica Italiana Automobiliti Torino (see Wikipedia article). He continues to speak on further enhancing support for MICEMS with an active researcher here in the institute, to be realised before the end of the year. He also spoke on the growing complexity of research in science and engineering, which often requires interdisciplinary skills and hence the need to open up to various different disciplines for which MICEMS can partake on. A specific mention of big data research and information security was made. He also spoke on the possibility of joint PhD programs. At the end of the meeting, Prof. Renuganth who was with us in the meeting, mentioned his strong support for the suggestions and informed us that he will personally see through the success of this initiative.

On the final point mentioned by Prof. Gilli above, I had some informal discussions with Prof. Adami during lunch. He reiterated the idea Prof. Lamberto Rondoni had mentioned some time ago on some interdisciplinary PhD programs. They have existing joint programs of such nature that can be seen in http://www.asp-poli.it/ and http://sipd.polito.it/index_en.html. He foresee that MICEMS will be the nexus of something bigger. My guess that these programs will be tailored accordingly with our available strength, the interest of both parties and both natural and engineered evolution of the initiative. INSPEM will do well to support such joint programs and further introduce multidiscplinary elements in the institute and further enhance our international prominence.

Let us now do our best.