Americas

Americas: customised approaches for a continent of contrasts

Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Chili

North and South America work differently in many aspects: organisation of research and education, relations with industry, inter-institution collaborations and places given to international collaborations all differ… Consequently, we have a variety of collaborations with researchers from the Americas. In each situation, the International Relations Department designs and promotes appropriate tools for the local environment.

North America: raising Inria's profile through structured collaborations

"North America is undoubtedly a geographical priority for Inria, due to the leadership of several American universities in  information and communication science and technology and their concern, similar to Inria, on  research and innovation," explains Aurélie Azar, Programme Manager for Americas. Inria has strong connections with both USA and Canada, especially via Associated Teams. In addition, a cooperation agreement has been signed with MITACS, a Canadian network of excellence. The USA, meanwhile, are a dominant power in the field, with the private and public sector together spending some $65 billion on ICST research and development. They have the ability to attract foreign specialists in advanced technology, and to set up new businesses. "Researchers are naturally drawn towards the United States. We are involved in a large number of collaborations with American laboratories, but paradoxically they are yet spread out," says Aurélie Azar. "Our aim is therefore both to strengthen existing collaborations and to give them coherence so as to raise their profile. We expect that Inria will become even more attractive to PhD students and researchers."

Our aim is to strengthen existing collaborations and make them more coherent in order to raise their profile. 

In partnership with Berkeley and Stanford Universities, Inria has launched a joint research program Inria@SiliconValley. The aim of the program is to promote and develop scientific collaborations between Inria project-teams and American research teams in these two universities, and related research institutions in California. On the other hand, the JLPC (Joint Laboratory on Petascale Computing) has been set up between Inria and University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. The purpose of the JLPC is to design software for new-generation computers such as that being developed as part of the Blue Water project.

Latin America: strengthening collaborations with Brazil and Chile

Chile and Brazil and, to a lesser extent, Argentina have been developing world-class centres of expertise in computer science and applied mathematics over the last ten years. The economic stability of the first two countries means that education and research can be solidly financed. One of the objectives set for South America is to make Inria a more attractive proposition for these excellent students.

Networking between France and South American countries in the field of ICST and Mathematics is done via the STIC-AmSud and MATH-AmSud programmes, but also through regular bilateral calls for projects. 

In parallel, an International Center of Excellence for Competitiveness, the Communication and Information Research and Innovation Center - CIRIC, developed in partnership with nine Chilean universities will begin in 2012. The purpose of the CIRIC is to host and catalyse Inria’s collaborations in Chile and interact with Latin American countries. It will be open to European and international partnerships.

CIRIC: project to create a centre of excellence in Chile

CORFO InnovaChile (Corporación de Fomento de la Producción), a Chilean government body created in 1939 and tasked with the development and encouragement of national industry, launched a programme in March 2009 to create "international centers of excellence for competitiveness" in Chile. The programme aims to encourage foreign organizations to establish a base in Chile in order to enhance research and development and produce advanced technology. Inriasubmitted a project  together with nine Chilean universities for  the creation of a research and technology transfer centre called Communication and Information Research and Innovation Center – CIRIC.  This project was selected by CORFO InnovaChile and has began in 2012. The CIRIC is working around research projects conducted jointly by Chilean and French researchers. This center will associate scientific expertise and a support structure for technology transfer and business creation.

The Center's three areas of research and development, selected by the CORFO InnovaChile, are:

  • Internet and telecommunications
  • Management of natural resources
  • Hybrid energy

CIRIC research teams are able to benefit from various human resources, researchers, postdocs, PhD students, young engineers and experts to help with the transfer. Research topics selected  develop skills in these new application areas, in a very favorable industrial transfer context.

STIC AmSud and MATH AmSud: developing the South American network

STIC AmSud is a science and technology cooperation programme involving participants from France, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Peru, Paraguay and Uruguay. The aim of this programme is to encourage and strengthen research and development collaborations and networking in the field of information and communication science and technology, through joint projects. Calls for proposals are issued, from which finalised and integrated fundamental research projects which have the potential to lead to technology transfer and technological innovation are selected and supported. These projects, which last two years, must be regionally oriented and must involve at least one French team and at least two research teams from two different participating South American countries.

MATH AmSud is based on the same model as the STIC AmSud programme. It is a joint initiative between French organisations and their counterparts in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay. The programme aims to promote and reinforce collaboration and the creation of research and development networks in the field of mathematics though joint research projects.

Inria-CNRS-FAPs cooperation

The Inria-CNRS-FAPs programme aims to reinforce ICST collaboration  between researchers belonging to Inria, CNRS and depending on one of 17 Brazil states which FAP is engaged in this programme. The programme's objective is to support mobility between France and Brazil.

For the brazilian part, this programme includes: : FACEPE (Pernambuco), FAPEAM (Amazonie), FAPEG (Goias), FAPEMA (Maranhão), FAPEMAT (Mato Grosso), FAPEMIG (Minas Gerais), FAPERGS (Rio Grande do Sul), FAPERN (Rio Grande do Norte), FAPERJ (Rio de Janeiro), FAPES (Espirito Santo), FAPESB (Bahia), FAPESP (Sao Paulo), FAPESPA (Pará), FAPITEC (Sergipe), FUNCAP (Ceará), Fundação Araucária (Parana), FUNDECT (Mato Grosso do Sul)

Inria@SiliconValley: strengthening our collaborative efforts in California

Berkeley and Stanford are among the top three or four American universities in our research. They have an extremely wide sphere of influence, encompassing not only scientists and students but also the general public and French institutions. We already have important ties with these two universities. In addition to the 18 Associate Teams, more than thirty Inria project-teams have links with these institutions. Our shared areas of interest are Inria's five fields of activity, with a particular focus on Networks, Systems and Services and Distributed Computing, and ICST for Life and Environment Sciences.

Consolidating our partnerships with the Californian universities means:

  • Building upon existing collaborations to establish jointly funded actions focussing on strategic research subjects for Inria and the partner university.
  • Developing researcher exchanges within this framework, through the Sabbaticals, Internships and Associate Teams programmes.
  • Presenting our joint actions together and raising their profile in terms of scientific communication (web and documents) and events (regular conferences).

REUSSI: Research Experiences for US Students at Inria

Programme description

National Science Foundation logo

The objective of this programme is to provide US students from American institutions with the opportunity to gain research experience through a minimum two months Internship at Inria. This programme enables the supervision and training-through-research of US students by researchers from the Inria project-teams. It provides them with financial support for their living expenses in France. These internships at Inria contribute to the scientific, professional and personal development of interns. Several activities are proposed in order to optimize the overall cultural and scientific experience of the US students.

Website

How do I get an Inria internship?

Robert France (Colorado State University, Dept. of Computer Science) is the US contact for this programme. He is responsible for advising US students interested in participating in the programme and for selecting the US students that will be funded. Please direct any questions about the programme to him.

What is the annual application and selection schedule?
  • September : call launched and subjects collected from the Inria teams
  • October: subjects sent to Robert France
  • October to November : candidates selected by Robert France and list sent to the Inria International Affairs Dpt.
  • December: list of candidates sent by the partner institutions is posted and selection is made by the internship managers.
  • January (following year): circulation of the final selection.
Financing

Graduate Students coming to Inria on the REUSSI programme will receive 1100 Euros (1500US$) in each month of their internships (50% by International Affairs Dpt and 50% by the host Team). The monthly stipend is tax exempt and students will also receive health insurance. The NSF will fund air travel for selected students.

Urbana Champaign: a sparkling experience

One year ago, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Inria formed the Joint Laboratory for Petascale Computing (High-Performance Computing, HPC). Based in Illinois’ university, the shared laboratory focuses on developing algorithms and software for petascale computing and beyond. Researchers at the laboratory have integrated their work with the Blue Waters project.  The aim is to perfect the most powerful computer in the world. The Joint Laboratory for Petascale Computing is led by Inria’s Franck Cappello and Illinois’ Marc Snir from Urbana-Champaign’s computer sciences department who worked on IBM’s large supercomputing system and has been involved in high performance computing for more than 20 years.

Keywords: International relations Americas International Relations Department

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