On January 14th, HUST and RWTH Aachen University (RWTH) attended an online meeting to review their past achievements, discuss measures to deepen future cooperation, and sign a key partnership agreement.

Attendees at the meeting included: You Zheng, President of HUST, Chen Jianguo, Vice President of HUST, Ulrich Rüdiger, President of RWTH, Uwe-Kai Schröder, President's Special Representative for China affairs and representatives from the Office of International Affairs, the Research Development Office and the School of Mechanical Science and Engineering. Chen Jie, Director for the Office of International Affairs of HUST, hosted the meeting.

Commencing proceedings, You Zheng praised RWTH as a top university in Germany and pointed out that HUST and RWTH share the same advantages in the field of natural science and engineering science, with both institutions recognizing technological innovation and transformation as important social responsibilities. He also said that it was a great pleasure to discuss cooperation with President Rüdiger, signing the key partnership agreement between the two universities to mark the beginning of the new year. The agreement is not only the result of the cooperation between the two universities over the past decade, but also the consensus of them pooling superior resources and carrying out multidisciplinary, wide-ranging and deep-level cooperation in the next stage.

Ulrich Rüdiger, extended his gratitude to HUST for its care and help during the pandemic， as it embodied the partnership and friendship between the two universities. He said that RWTH regards China as a significant strategic country. HUST is one of China’s most revered universities., and its superior disciplines such as mechanical engineering, optical engineering, and medicine are fully consistent with the elite disciplines of RWTH. The same discipline structure and previous mutual trust and cooperation provided a favorable foundation for deepening the cooperation between the two universities. Within this new phase, Rüdiger expressed that he expected the two universities to further broaden the scope of cooperation, cultivate more cooperative teams through joint fund projects, and carry out scientific research and personnel training cooperation in the medical field.

Professor Carsten Bolm from the chemistry department of RWTH and professor Gao Liang from the School of Mechanical Science and Engineering of HUST delivered speeches on behalf of the professors of the two universities, congratulating the signing of the key partnership agreement and putting forward their expectations for future cooperation. During the strategic dialogue, Chen Jianguo and Uwe-Kai Schröder put forward the next cooperation initiatives. Both universities agreed to carry out all-round cooperation based on the student exchange in more disciplines, establish joint seeds grants, and encourage scholars of the two universities to carry out exploratory cooperation. Lin Lei, Vice Dean of the Research Development Office and Dean of the Institute of Applied Science, introduced the international cooperation in the transformation of technological achievements of HUST, and Dr. Chen Jie explained the cooperation initiatives relating to both sides.

The presidents of the two universities signed the “HUST-RWTH Key Partnership Agreement” online, and renewed the “HUST-RWTH Memorandum of Uderstanding ”and the“HUST-RWTH Memorandum of Student Exchange”.

On January 13th, Vice President Chen Jianguo and Ute Habel, Vice-president of International Affairs of RWTH, held a video meeting. The two representatives reached an agreement on further promoting the cooperative relationship between the two universities in the new era, alongside exchanging their views on the initiative of establishing the Sino-German Consortium on Medical Education initiated by HUST; including medicine collaborations between the two universities. Professor Lan Xiaoli from Union Hospital affiliated to Tongji Medical College and Professor Shi Qijia from Affiliated Wuhan Mental Health Center attended the meeting and exchanged views with Professor Alexander Heinzel, Director of Nuclear Medicine department and Professor Thomas Frondl, Director of Psychosomatic Medicine Department of RWTH Hospital on student exchange and collaborative research.

The Key Partnership Initiative is an inter-university strategic key partner group set up by HUST in the new era, based on extensive and in-depth disciplinary cooperation. The initiative aims to concentrate the university’s superior resources and carry out sustainable exchanges and cooperation with partners in personnel training, scientific research cooperation and cultural exchanges to further benefit the development of human society.

Founded in 1870, RWTH is one of the top universities of Science and Technology in the world and enjoys a high reputation in Engineering Technology. HUST officially established an inter-university cooperation with RWTH and carried out many projects in student exchange, personnel training, and joint research, etc., and jointly participated in the Sino-German University Presidents' Forum and Sino-German Electric Vehicle Forum launched by the education/scientific research authorities of the two governments.

Source: Office of International Affairs

Written by: Zhang Zhanyu

Edited by: Luo Xiaofan, Andrew, Jiang Jing