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EuCARD >> News >> Newsletters >> Issue 1 >> Article 1

A word from the Project Coordinator

I shall first take the opportunity of the Newsletter to welcome all EuCARD members, whose number just passed 200 persons, and wish them exciting and fruitful collaborations in their various tasks.

EuCARD officially started on April 1^st, with a meeting of the Governing Board and two days later a meeting of the Steering Committee. The Governing Board elected Professor Tord Ekelof, Upssala University, as chairman.

Both meetings were largely attended, focused and lively: a positive signal for a dynamical collaboration.

A variety of questions were debated, including the possible role of EuCARD for communication to science policy makers, its multidisciplinary position (High Energy Physics, Nuclear Physics, Synchrotron Radiation sources, other), how to contribute to sustainable structures and on the respective value of collaboration and competition. We shall come back to some of these points in later newsletters.

Jean-Pierre Koutchouk, EuCARD project coordinator. Image courtesy: Jean-Pierre Koutchouk

Besides these political aspects, the two bodies share the Coordination views of streamlining as much as possible the EuCARD reporting and internal procedures and favour the scientific outcome.

While the Governing Board and Steering Committee gathered the partners’ representatives and Work Package coordinators, an additional essential level and responsibility in EuCARD are the task level and task coordination. In addition to the information provided by the EuCARD management structure, we hope that the newsletter will become a privileged link between all coordinators and members to EuCARD. The editor of the Newsletter, Kate Kahle, will be delighted to receive not only your comments or questions, but as well short scientific news for informal publication in the Newsletter.

Today, the coordination office is still dealing largely with administrative aspects and the communication framework, always with a goal of helping the EuCARD members to focus on their scientific objectives, by adjusting as far as possible all administrative aspects to the actual needs. The EuCARD website is now up and running, including an Intranet of collaborative workspaces using a new technology to facilitate communication.

The trans-national access MICE is ready to accept applications and the first project deliverables have been reported. A publication portal will soon be implemented, releasing authors from the details of publication and reviewing policies, together with a document repository. We are now looking forward to the scientific/technical milestones and deliverables that are the primary goal of our collaboration.

- Jean-Pierre Koutchouk, CERN