Travel Grant for Seventh Mediterranean Chemical Engineering Conference, Greece

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PI: Cramer, Steven M.Proposal Number: CBET - 1137546Institution: Rensselaer Polytechnic InstituteTitle: Travel Grant for Seventh Mediterranean Chemical Engineering ConferenceThis proposal requests for travel funds for U.S. academic representatives to attend the 7th Eastern Mediterranean Chemical Engineering Conference (EMCC7) to be held in Greece in late 2011 or 2012. Professor Maria Klapa, Head of the Metabolic Engineering and Systems Biology Laboratory at the Foundation for Research and Technology (FORTH) in Patras will be the Chair of the Conference. The participating countries will be Greece, Turkey, Greece, Israel, Italy, Bulgaria, Rumania and the United States. Academic chemical engineers from other Eastern Mediterranean countries will also be invited.Intellectual Merit: The majors goals of this conference are to (1) promote contacts and potential research collaboration between the participating countries (2) enhance research and teaching in chemical engineering in the participating countries by providing a forum for interaction among the participants (3) have significant industrial/societal impacts on the participating countries through the extensive scientific and personal exchanges. As has been the case for the previous conferences in this series, it is expected the participants will be made up of approximately 25 academic chemical engineers from the U.S., 50 from the host country (Greece), at least 20 from Italy, Turkey, Israel and participants from Bulgaria, Romania and Jordan. In addition, it is expected that a large number of graduate students will attend from the participating Eastern Mediterranean Countries. This conference will be the seventh conference of a series. The US EMCC coordinating committee consisting of Steve Cramer (Rensselaer), Nick Abbott (Wisconsin) and Alex Katz (Berkeley) will put together a team of first rate U.S. investigators who are both excellent in research and very committed to establishing and continuing collaborations with investigators from the other participating countries. It is expected that approximately25 U.S. presenters will be invited. This will include a blend of senior researchers and promising young investigators. Special travel supplements will also be provided to five US participants to visit and lecture in Greece and the other countries (Israel, Turkey, Italy, Bulgaria or Rumania) to develop and/or promote collaborations.Broader Impact: It is expected based on past conference results that there will be a significant and broad impact on the U.S. engineers attending this EMCC conference. The first three EMCC Conferences have had major impacts in acquainting US, Turkish, Israeli, and Greek academics with their research interests and capabilities and in fostering research collaborations. The fourth, fifth and sixth conferences provided further opportunities, by expanding the conference to include Italy, Bulgaria and Rumania. An added benefit of these conferences is the exposure they have provided for large numbers of graduate students from the Eastern Mediterranean to interact directly with both seasoned and young faculty researchers from the U.S. and other countries. These conferences have provided excellent forums for fruitful discussions on curriculum issues among faculty of the participating countries. In addition to the personal contacts that the U.S. participants will make with people from the other countries, it will be beneficial to U.S. interests to foster exchanges of research and teaching ideas and of personnel, and establish research collaborations between chemical engineers from the U.S. and chemical engineers from the Eastern Mediterranean countries. Significant efforts will be made to include both young and underrepresented faculty in the group of U.S. participants. It is also likely that recruitment of potential graduate students may occur informally.