1.1 An MoU was entered between Anna University Chennai (Madras Institute of Technology) and CEERI, Pilani through CEERI Chennai Centre, during October 2008 to promote academic and research interaction and co-operation. The Director, CEERI and Vice Chancellor, Anna University signed the MoU at a function organized at Anna University , Chennai on 23.10.2008.

1.2 SRM University, Kattankulathur, Chennai & SRM College of Pharmacy, Kattankulathur, Chennai have entered in to MoU with CEERI Centre, Chennai during July, 2008 to promote academic and research interaction and co-operation for mutual benefit of getting student trainees, sharing of facilities, sharing of knowledge in the identified areas of expertise, etc. The Director, CEERI and Vice Chancellor, SRM University signed the MoUs at a function organized at SRM University , Kattankulathur, Chennai on 2.7.2008.  The MoUs facilitate the Centre in planning for joint programmes in the areas of machine vision system for societal applications, DSP/Embedded System design in respect of SRM University and in the areas of expertise with respect to pharmaceutical industries and traditional medicines through application of chemo metrics and spectroscopy instrumentation in respect of SRM College of Pharmacy. 

Mr.V.Venkataraman, Scientist-EII has co-ordinated the Pre-conference tutorial on Chemometrics Applications to Spectroscopy during the Second International Conference on “Perspectives in Vibrational Spectroscopy”  (ICOPVS-2008) held at Trivandrum, Kerala from 24th – 28th February, 2008, organized by Department of Physics of Mar Ivanios College jointly with Kerala State Council for Science, Technology and Environment and The University of Kerala and CEERI Centre, Chennai. 

Mr.K.Subrahmanyam, Scientist-in-charge has participated as a member of National Organizing Committee for the Second International Conference ICOPVS-2008.

Mr.V.Venkataraman, Scientist-EII attended the “EU Info Seminars on Research Funding Opportunities in Chennai” on 11^th July, 2008 at Chennai organized by Delegation of European Commission to India , Bhutan & Nepal , New Delhi .

Dr. A. Gopal, Scientist-EII & Mr. D. Palaniandi, Technical Officer-A, attended the two days Training Programme on “Halcon Software – An integrated Development Environment for Imaging and Image Analysis”, 8-9^th August, 2008, PSG College of Technology, Coimbatore.

Mr. V. Venkataraman attended and represented the country in the First Asian NIR Symposium held at Epochal, Tsukuba City , Japan from 10-15^th November, 2008 . Mr. Venkataraman also presented a paper on “A New Approach in Sample and Time Optimization for Selective Multi-constituents Analyses through Near Infrared Spectroscopy” (V.Venkataraman & K.Subrahmanyam), during the First Asian NIR Symposium.

Mr. S. Md. Iqbal and Dr. R. Govindaraj, Scientists-EII participated in the training programme on “CSIR Leadership Development Programme” organized by HRDC, CSIR, Ghaziabad from 23^rd November to 5^th December, 2008 at Ghaziabad .

Dr. A. Gopal attended the National Symposium on Instrumentation (NSI-33) during 8^th to 10^th December, 2008, at Visakhapatnam , jointly organized by Instrument Society of India (ISOI) and AU College of Engineering, Andhra University . Dr.Gopal also presented two papers on “Image Processing Technique for detection of black spots on Mango Surface” (K.Kathiravan, et al.) and “Paper Dirt Speck Measurement using Image Processing Techniques” (ASV Sarma, et al.) in NSI-33.