INDIAN INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY KANPUR

OFFICE OF DEAN, R&D

IITK Research Challenges Symposium (REACH)

Reach 2020

Brief history:

REACH, an annual symposium series was conceptualized to showcase the ongoing research on campus and promote interdisciplinary research & interaction amongst faculty, students, and research staff of the Institute and was held in the year 2007, 2008 and 2010. Each year, the focus was on a few major themes (3 to 4 topics) of research in the Institute and faculty working in these areas will be invited to speak on their work in a way that is intelligible to a general audience. In addition, some students and distinguished external researchers were also invited to speak. Each theme had one or two coordinators who organized the theme and invited the speakers. The participants of the symposium include IITK faculty and students, as identified by the Advisory and Organizing Committees. The topics covered and the organizers for the last three meetings are given below:

REACH 2007: Materials of Tomorrow | Controlling and Living with Vibrations | The Art of Experiments

REACH 2008: Biomimetics | Future of Energy | Scientific Methodology of Forecasting

REACH 2010: High-Performance Computing: Applications in Science and Engineering | Innovation and Design | Environment, Health, and Life | Creating a Research Vision for IIT Kanpur

The annual series being revived from 2020 and that the REACH is being made as a yearly event.

Mode of operation:

  • The Director will constitute an advisory committee with a three-year term. The mandate of the advisory committee is to identify emerging themes and to identify organizers for each year's event. The organizing committee thus designated will coordinate the meeting by inviting active researchers in the chosen field for the given year. About 60 to 80 researchers will be invited for each event (includes faculty, postdoc/research staff, and students).
  • The REACH meeting would be a two-day meeting (two nights, one full and two half days). The sessions include plenary talk, short talks, discussion hours and poster presentation. The meeting will be held in a place outside the campus.
  • The DORD office would open a "REACH project account" to cover the expenses related to the meeting, and the ADRD would be the PI of this project. To minimize the Institute support for this activity, the invited participants will be requested to pay a token registration fee to partially cover the stay and the other expenses from project grants. Travel will have to borne by the participants through his/her grants.
  • The Institute will extend limited financial support to meet expenses that cannot be met with the grant raised. These contributions can be used to support invited speakers from outside the campus, and to support boarding and lodging. The organizer will be requested to raise sponsorship for the event as well. The unspent grant, if any, would remain in the REACH project for events planned in subsequent years.


Advisory Committee for REACH 2020:

Dean, Research & Development (Chairperson)

Dean, faculty Affairs

Prof. Vinod Singh, CHM

Prorf. S.C. Srivastava, EE

Associate Dean Research & Development (Convener)