The University of Birmingham has extended an agreement with Germany’s Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM) that will see the partners create a joint research centre for chemistry and materials science.

This will initially focus on materials characterisation, catalytic chemistry and corrosion, but it will later expand to cover other topics.

The partnership will also see experts at BAM (www.bam.de) and the University of Birmingham continue to collaborate in a number of areas, including environmental sciences, energy, additive manufacturing and infrastructure (resilience monitoring, buried resources and railways).

Robin Mason at the University of Birmingham said: “Europe continues to be a region of key importance for our research, and we will continue to build and strengthen partnerships with major institutions in the European Union (www.birmingham.ac.uk).

“We have enjoyed a productive first year of partnership with BAM, and our on-going work together will provide an excellent basis for developing exciting collaborations — benefitting the advancement and use of scientific knowledge in the UK, Germany and beyond.”

Over the next three years, the partners will continue to collaborate on joint activities that include research experiments, staff exchanges, seminars, joint publications and reports, as well as exchanging data, materials and samples.