2008 China-Ireland International Information and Communications Technologies conference (CIICT 2008)

Front row (Left to Right): Ms Xiao Xiaoyun, Director of Information Technology, NSFC; Prof Zhong Yixing, BUPT; Prof Zhang Yinghai, Vice President, BUPT; Prof Zhang Zhaotian, Deputy Director General, NSFC; H.E. Declan Kelleher, Irish Ambassador to China; Dr David Linton, Queens University, Belfast; Prof David Cotter, Tyndall National Institute; Prof Michael Ryan, DCU; Mr Wilford Zhao, Director China, IET.

A successful 2008 China-Ireland International Information and Communications Technologies conference (CIICT 2008) was held in Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (BUPT) on 26-28 September. This year the conference was addressed by the Irish Ambassador to China, H.E. Declan Kelleher, and involved plenty of participation from both Ireland and China.

The 2008 China-Ireland International Information and Communications Technologies conference (CIICT 2008) was held in Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (BUPT) on 26-28 September. This year the conference was addressed by the Irish Ambassador to China, H.E. Declan Kelleher, who praised the collaboration between DCU and Chinese universities and deemed it as a “successful model”.

Dr Xiaojun Wang of the School of Electronic Engineering, DCU, is a main initiator and organizer of the CIICT conference series, which is jointly sponsored and organised by Chinese and Irish Universities. This international conference focuses on topical research in the broad area of Information and Communications Technologies. The stated objectives of the conference series are to strengthen science and technology research collaboration and to provide a platform for facilitating academic and industrial research interactions between China, Ireland and other countries. The first CIICT conference in the series was hosted by Hangzhou Dianzi University (HDU) in 2006, DCU was the host in 2007, National University of Ireland Maynooth (NUIM) will host CIICT in August 2009, and Wuhan University has committed to host CIICT 2010.

CIICT 2008 builds on the successes of previous years, 450 paper submissions were received of which 170 papers were accepted, published, and will be indexed by the Inspec database. The plenary session, chaired Prof Michael Ryan of DCU School of Computing, included speakers Dr Paul Dodd, head of Industry-Research Development in Science Foundation Ireland, Prof Zhong Yixing of BUPT, Prof David Cotter of Tyndall National Institute, and Dr David Linton from Queens University of Belfast. Dr Zhen Liu, a post-doc in the Network Innovations Centre in RINCE received a best paper award at the conference.

The School of Electronic Engineering in DCU has strong collaboration with Chinese universities. Five PhD students funded by the China Scholarship Council have come to the school this year and over 80 taught masters students from Wuhan University have enrolled in a collaborative master program in the last two years. The school has also a number of IRCSET funded PhD students and post-docs from prestigious Chinese universities. It also has joint PhD supervision arrangements with a number of Chinese universities.