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Supporting Programs : Research Support : Special Equipment for

Overview	Collaborative Research	Equipment Support	Thesis Support	Coordinator

Special Equipment for Collaborative Research Program

Background

Collaborative Research Program is primarily designed to carry out “joint” thesis research supervision activities for AUN/SEED-Net students between Host Institution and Japanese Supporting Universities to produce high quality thesis research of international standard and to ensure the completion of the graduate degree within a reasonable duration. Each host field is supposed to be the strongest field for each Host Institution, and thus it is expected that laboratory facility for research activities is well equipped to carry out thesis research by AUN/SEED-Net students. However, after finalizing a few research themes and a number of very specific research topics under each theme, Host Institution may need to readjust research orientation slightly to cater the need of other Member Institutions and Japanese Supporting Universities. Therefore, it may happen that each host program may need to further strengthen laboratory facility to accomplish such specific research need and activities with high quality.

The AUN/SEED-Net Project, therefore, plans to support such special equipment to successfully carry out Collaborative Research Program. Since Collaborative Research Program itself can support equipment and spare parts of not more than JPY200,000 per item, the equipment to be purchased should exceed JPY200,000 per item and would be fully utilized for years to come by students of AUN/SEED-Net. It is expected that AUN/SEED-Net would support such equipment provision program for Japanese Fiscal Year (JFY) 2004 and 2005 only, given annual approval by JICA Tokyo Office.

Objectives

1.	To help carry out Collaborative Research projects effectively under adequate laboratory facility.
2.	To ensure high quality thesis research of master’s and doctoral students (namely, leading to reputable international refereed journal publication) and to ensure the completion of the graduate degree within reasonable duration (two years for master’s degree and three years for doctoral degree) through the involvement of Japanese professors.

Requirement

1.	Host Institution must finalize Collaborative Research Program scheme, or clearly identify research themes and a collection of possible thesis research topics to be continuously and progressively carried out for several years to come by AUN/SEED-Net students, along with names of advisors and Japanese collaborators who are going to be actively involved.
2.	Each equipment item needs clear evidence and justification why it is needed and how the equipment is utilized in years to come. It is also essential that equipment to be purchased should be clearly linked to a research theme and research topics in Collaborative Research Program.
3.	The equipment to be purchased should exceed JPY200,000 per item; however, the grand total of equipment purchasing should not exceed JPY5,000,000 per field.
4.	The Program will not support any recurrent cost (e.g. operational cost, housing cost, etc.) of the proposed equipment.

Eligible Applicants

Principal investigators of ‘approved’ Collaborative Research projects of each Host Institution

Type of Procurement

There are 2 types of procurement, namely “national procurement*” and “P/T (Procurement and transportation by the Headquarter of JICA)”. AUN/SEED-Net Project generally recommends national procurement considering the shorter procedure and better maintenance or aftercare by local supplier. P/T takes much more time compared to the national procurement, sometimes more than 1 year. However, if Host Institution still requests P/T, please consult individually with the Project.

* National procurement does not ONLY mean buying product locally. Buying imported product through local supplier is also in the category of national procurement.

Procedures & Application Deadline

Proposals for the funding of Special Equipment for Collaborative Research must be submitted in collection with a cover letter signed by the Dean or the Representative of each Host Institution in order to control the total proposed amount not to exceed the ceiling of JPY5,000,000 per host field. The AUN/SEED-Net Project will award equipment provision in consultation with the Co-principal Investigator (co-advisor) and the Coordinator of Field Coordinating University after due evaluation.