Release date: April 20, 2006
Contact: Beverly Cox Clark at 404-712-8780 or beverly.clark@emory.edu

Science Exchange Announced Between
Emory, Imperial College

The Sir Alexander Fleming Building at Imperial College London houses the School of Medicine and Department of Biology.

Emory University and the renowned Imperial College London have developed a new partnership to promote student study abroad in the sciences and faculty research collaborations between the two institutions.

Imperial College London is an independent constituent part of the University of London, and is consistently rated in the top three of universities in the United Kingdom. The agreement will allow undergraduates in chemistry, biological science and other disciplines from each institution to learn abroad as part of a student exchange program. The program is open to highly qualified students and will be initially available to two students a year from each institution.

The program will benefit both the education and the research mission of Emory, and adds to university's strategic efforts to internationalize research and learning, especially in the sciences, says Preetha Ram, assistant dean for the sciences at Emory.

"Internationalization plays an important and critical role in engaging young scholars at Emory. Our students will benefit from an early exposure to the high calibre science education that is offered at Imperial, and our faculty will also gain from research collaborations and joint projects. Several faculty have research collaborations with Imperial already, and are looking forward to engaging undergraduates in these efforts," Ram says.

The new agreement adds to Emory's expanding Science Experience Abroad program, a joint effort of the Office for Undergraduate Education and the Center for International Programs Abroad. "This new agreement adds to Emory's diverse growth in offerings for science students, which range from summer research opportunities, internships and community involvement to study abroad programs around the world,” says Philip Wainwright, director of CIPA.

Emory's chemistry department played an active role in the development of the program, which has its roots in the long-time research collaborations between Emory chemistry professor Dennis Liotta and professor Tony Barrett at Imperial.

"Both Imperial and Emory are leaders in the fields of science and medicine, and this agreement will allow students to learn with top academics on both sides of the Atlantic. This is an excellent basis from which to explore further opportunities for collaboration with Emory," says Barrett, head of the Synthetic Chemistry Research Group at Imperial who led the effort to develop the agreement at his school.

The first student exchange will take place in 2007. Students interested in taking part should contact Ram at Emory.

Emory University is known for its demanding academics, outstanding undergraduate college of arts and sciences, highly ranked professional schools and state-of-the-art research facilities. For more than a decade Emory has been named one of the country's top 25 national universities by U.S. News & World Report. In addition to its nine schools, the university encompasses The Carter Center, Yerkes National Primate Research Center and Emory Healthcare, the state's largest and most comprehensive health care system.

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The Times Higher Education Supplement ranks Imperial College London amongst the top ten science universities in the world. It embodies and delivers world-class scholarship, education and research in science, engineering and medicine, with particular regard to their application in industry, commerce and healthcare. Imperial is dedicated to widely communicating the significance and benefits of science, to fostering interdisciplinary research and participating in international collaborations and scholarship.

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