On July 11, 2017, the Institute of Automation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (INRIA) of France and the Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) of the Netherlands, the three founding consortium members of the Sino-European Laboratory in Computer Science, Automation and Applied Mathematics (LIAMA) signed an agreement to deepen cooperation at LIAMA in key research areas.

LIAMA celebrates its 20th anniversary. (Image from CAS)

Under this new agreement, the LIAMA consortium promises to seek more cooperation opportunities to complement each other's strengths in important research fields such as information technology and artificial intelligence, so that LIAMA, with unrelenting efforts by all involved, will become a mature and stable platform for science and technology exchange and communication between China and Europe.

During the signing ceremony, which also marked the 20th anniversary of LIAMA, speeches were delivered by CAS Vice President Zhang Jie, the Ambassador of France to China H. Exc. Mr. Jean-Maurice Ripertr, and the Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands to China H. Exc. Mr. Paul Menkveld. Officials and representatives from more than ten other institutions also attended the ceremony. "LIAMA has brought together scientists from China and Europe to pursue and explore the truth as well as to share scientific achievements," Zhang said.

LIAMA has made great achievements with 20 years of development. Its Brainnetome Project has drawn a whole brain fine zoning map and a whole brain connectivity map, which has attracted the attention of international counterparts. In addition, its research results on Human-Machine Interaction have become the main focus of the National Key Research and Development Plan. And, its collaborative study of neural computing chips has promoted China's research into brain-liked chips.

Founded in 1997 by CAS and INRIA, LIAMA is the first joint research lab of China and France. It was approved by the Ministry of Science and Technology for designation as an International Joint Research Center at the national level in 2008, at which time its name was changed from Sino-French to Sino-European as more research institutes such as CWI joined the consortium.

Source: CAS