Modi's US Visit: Will it break new frontiers?

Will Prime Minister Narendra Modi's US visit be path breaking?

A series of MoUs and cooperation in new fields are on cards: 

The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, on September 24 gave its approval for signing a Joint Declaration between the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) of India and the National Science Foundation (NSF) of the United States of America, to initiate a new program entitled Global Initiative of Academic Networks (GIAN) in Higher Education. GIAN aims at tapping the talent pool of scientists and entrepreneurs to engage with the institutes of higher education in India to augment the country`s existing academic resources, accelerate the pace of quality reforms, and further strengthen India`s scientific and technological capabilities. 

The proposed India-US Cooperation will be beneficial for adoption of newer methods of pedagogy; infuse creativity and innovation driven learning and professional rigour at a relatively lower cost; boosting research in cutting edge technologies and to build stronger academic networks between both countries. The US faculty would undertake teaching at Indian Universities, networked research initiatives in topics of mutual interest and development of international entrepreneurship programmes by making the curriculum more industry oriented for better employability. 

The proposal envisages the creation of a channel for US academics in science, technology, engineering and mathematics to spend part of their time teaching in academic and research institutions across India. To start with, the programme would facilitate inviting up to 1000 faculty every year from amongst the best institutions in the US, who will be deputed to identified institutions in India. 

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Joint Declaration of Intent for cooperation in the field of higher education for Indo-US partnership for Study Webs of Active-Learning for Young Aspiring Minds (SWAYAM), a programme for Online Education

The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, today gave its approval for signing of a Joint Declaration of Intent between the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD) and the U.S. Department of State for cooperation in the field of higher education for Study Webs of Active-Learning for Young Aspiring Minds (SWAYAM), a programme for online education. Under the cooperation, the SWAYAM platform server will be based in India and US universities will be invited to offer post-graduate academic programs with certification on the SWAYAM platform. The new Indo-US Partnership for Online Education (IUPOE) programme will comprise a mechanism that will enable the top universities of the US (top 100 in global ranking ) to create and share post graduate online courses (and associated assets) on the Indian "SWAYAM" platform. SWAYAM is an online platform of the Ministry of HRD through which online programmes/courses will be offered to students in India. Each American University will share courses created by its top educators. The cooperation programme will be integrated to strengthen the National Mission on Education through the use of ICT (NMEICT) in India. ZZZ Memorandum of Understanding between India and United States for cooperation in gas hydrates The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, today gave its approval for signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between India and the United States for cooperation in gas hydrates for a period of five years. Cooperation with the United States Department of Energy (USDOE) in the field of gas hydrates, will facilitate active participation of the National Gas Hydrate Programme (NGHP) and DOE scientists in data collection, analysis and identification of sites for pilot production testing. This would be under the planned NGHP Expedition-02 and 03 in deep water areas of the Eastern, Western and Andaman Sea. Exchange of scientific and technical information will help Indian scientists enhance understanding of Indian gas hydrates and keep them abreast with international developments. Gas hydrates are considered as vast resources of natural gas and are known to occur in marine sediments on continental shelf margins. Worldwide work on gas hydrates is at a Research and Development stage and no commercial exploitation has so far been reported. Gas hydrate resources in India are estimated at 1894 TCM and these deposits occur in Western, Eastern and Andaman offshore areas. Cooperation with the USDOE in the field of gas hydrates, will facilitate active participation of the NGHP and DOE scientists in data collection, analysis and identification of sites for pilot production testing, under the planned NGHP Expedition-02 and 03 in deep water areas of the Eastern, Western and Andaman Sea. India's participation in the Thirty Metre Telescope Project at Mauna Kea, Hawaii, USA  The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, today gave its approval for India`s participation in the Thirty Metre Telescope (TMT) Project at Mauna Kea, Hawaii, USA at a total cost of Rs. 1299.8 crores from 2014-23. The TMT will be constructed at a cost of US$ 1.47 billion (in 2012 Base Year Dollars) by an international consortium consisting of institutions from the USA, Canada, Japan, India and China. From the Indian side, this will be a joint project of the Department of Science and Technology (DST) and the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE). With its contributions, India will be a 10 percent partner in the project and 70 percent of its contributions will be "in kind". This will translate into 25 to 30 observing nights on the telescope for Indian scientists per year. This will enable Indian scientists to access a state-of-the-art telescope to answer some of the most fundamental questions in modern science. Indian institutions and industry will acquire or gain access to sophisticated technologies of relevance to the country. India will also become a founding member of an important international scientific project. The TMT will enable scientists to study fainter objects far away from us in the Universe, which gives information about early stages of the evolution of the Universe. It will also give finer details of not-so-far-away objects such as undiscovered planets and other objects in the Solar System and planets around other stars. This partnership will also enhance India’s technological capabilities in high-technology areas such as primary mirror segment figuring and polishing, mirror support system and edge sensor assembly and testing, software for observatory controls, data analysis pipelines, adaptive optics techniques etc. The TMT will be one of the largest optical-infrared telescopes to come up in the next decade. Its 30 metre diameter primary mirror will consist of 492 segments of 1.44 metre diameter each. These mirror segments will be cleverly positioned relative to each other through sophisticated sensors, actuators and control systems, so that the entire assembly behaves like single monolithic mirror. Its performance will be further improved by employing "adaptive optics" techniques thereby achieving performance as if the telescope is located above the Earth`s atmosphere. This will be a national project anchored in the Indian Institute of Astrophysics (IIA), Bangalore and led by IIA, Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES), Nainital and Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), Pune. It will leverage the best of science and technology from wherever available in the country - from R&D institutions, higher educational institutions and industry. All interested scientists from the country will get time on the TMT for their scientific studies on competitive basis. The implementation of the project will be overseen by a high-level Executive Council co-chaired by Secretary, Department of Science and Technology and Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission and Secretary, Department of Atomic Energy. (source Information Ministry, Government of India)