The 2011-iChEM directors Zhongqun Tian and Can Li attended American Chemistry Society (ACS) meeting in New Orleans of USA during the period of April 7 to 12, 2013.

During the meeting, the two directors participated in Chinese-American Chemical Society (CACS) dinner, and Prof. Tian hosted the Chinese-American Chemistry and Chemical Biology Professors Association (CAPA) dinner. Prof. Tian introduced construction and development of the 2011 Program and 2011-iChEM, and sincerely invited experts and scholars abroad to join our Center in various ways, or to recommend excellent candidates such as researchers, post-doctor and doctoral students for our Center. The attendees are very interested in the Center, and asked many questions of their concerns.

On April 11, Prof. Tian informally visited University of California-Santa Barbara (UCSB)’s Institute of Energy Efficiency (IEE) on his way back to China. He discussed with Prof. David Auston, the directior of IEE, Prof. Rick Dhlquist, the Chairman of Chemistry Department of UCSB, and Prof. Galen Stucky of IEE about our collaborations such as undergraduate or graduate student exchange, etc, based on our agreement for collaboration. The Memorandum of Understanding between iChEM and UCSB’s IEE has been approved and currently in final process.

The Material Sciences in Chemistry at UCSB is ranked on the top globally and UCSB is a university with strong collaborative innovation spirit. On Nov. 28 of 2012, the United States Department of Energy announced to invest $1.3 billion to promote top research projects in the USA and UCSB’s Energy Materials in Chemistry is among them. A substantial and long-term cooperative partnership with UCSB has a positive and important significance for the Center to achieve the goal of world-class.