The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS)  announced a collaboration agreement on May 27 with the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) to develop a joint Center of Excellence in Brain Mapping for the purpose of collaborative research and education in neuro-imaging.

CAS Vice President Li Jiayang and Penn President Amy Gutmann signed an MOU to establish a cooperative research relationship and to facilitate the international exchange of ideas between the two institutions.

"This is surely an important initiative that will lay down a strong foundation between the researchers concerned on both sides and the two organizations- that are--- CAS and U-Penn. The Chinese Academy of Sciences has rendered its strong support to this partnership, my being here is a clear indication and will continue to do so in the future for the benefits of both sides.” said Vice President LI. 

As part of the current agreement, researchers and scientists from the CAS Institute of Biophysicsand Penn will develop a center to advance the application of neuroimaging to basic and cognitive neuroscience research, including the development and evaluation of novel imaging technologies and their translation into new biomedical applications, and basic science studies for detection, characterization, diagnosis, and image-guided treatment of brain diseases affecting people around the world.

IBP is one of the pioneering institutions for brain mapping research in China and it has been CAS’s strategy to build it into an international window of brain mapping. Penn’s neuroimaging program is recognized not only for its continued development of novel approaches for image acquisition and analysis, but also for its numerous clinical neuroimaging programs that translate these discoveries into applications to promote human health.  Through previous collaborations, both institutions have found a lot of common areas of mutual research interests and have seen and felt the benefits of collaboration. They strongly feel the need of creating a joint platform for the deepening and widening of this collaboration.

After the signing ceremony, faculty from the two institutions joined researchers and administrators for a symposium on neuroimaging to highlight the range of problems and methods represented by the CAS-Penn Center of Excellence in Brain Mapping, including cognitive and systems neuroscience, computational anatomy and physiology, and clinical and translational neurosciences.