The International Centre for Chemical and Biological Sciences, University of Karachi (ICCBS) and Tianjin Institute of Industrial Biotechnology (TIB), Chinese Academy of Sciences have recently signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Cooperation of Science and Technology.

Prof. Dr. Muhammad Iqbal Choudhary, the Director of ICCBS and Prof. Yanhe Ma, the Director of TIB signed the MoU on behalf of the both sides. Prof. Jibin Sun, the Deputy Director of TIB, Dr. Atia-tul Wahabre, the Associate Professor of ICCBS and related personnels of TIB attended the signing ceremony.

The broad objectives of this MoU are to promote wide cooperation in various fields of bioorganic chemistry and biological sciences, especially in natural products, including R&D, staff exchange, transformation and industrialization of scientific and technological achievement.

The MoU agrees that the two sides will co-establish China-Pakistan Joint Research Centre for Natural Products based on the framework of the National Technology Innovation Centre for Synthetic Biology and co-support the related S&T activities of the COMSATS (Commission on Science and Technology for Sustainable Development in the South, Pakistan) such as the International Thematic Research Group on Natural Products Sciences.

The signing of this MoU will promote the technical cooperation and industrial development in related fields between China and Pakistan to achieve mutually beneficial win-win cooperation through complementarities. Meanwhile, as the two COMSATS International S&T Centre of Excellences, it will facilitate both sides play much bigger roles to promote the sustainable development by science and technology in developing countries.