The Hindu : Kerala News : Cusat plans tsunami study centre

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Dec 30, 2004

Kerala

Kerala

Cusat plans tsunami study centre

By Our Staff Reporter

KOCHI, DEC. 29. The Cochin University of Science and Technology (Cusat) plans to set up a centre to study tsunami and, in the long term, to evolve an early warning system.

The Vice-Chancellor of the University, P.K. Abdul Azis, said here today that a proposal would be submitted to the Directorate of Science and Technology (DST), Government of India, for long-term funding of the project.

The study centre would come up initially as a cell in the Department of Marine Geology and Geophysics under the School of Marine Sciences. The new cell, under an expert geophysicist, would collect data on tsunami, liaise with laboratories all over the world which are engaged in tsunami studies and prepare a blueprint for setting up the study centre. It would have to be funded on a long-term basis by the Centre. The aim of the centre is ultimately to evolve tsunami early warning system so that the research benefited the common people.

Prof. Azis said that tsunami was a relatively new phenomenon to India and that last Sunday's ferocious tidal waves were a warning to Indian scientific community. So far there was only theoretical knowledge of tsunami and there was nothing to offer to the people. The proposed study centre is projected to fill this gap.

Earlier, addressing an audience at the inauguration of an international conference on biotechnology and neurosciences, Prof. Azis said that the University would provide facilities and encourage research in biotechnology and related areas. Getting research projects in these areas would be a priority for the University, he added.

Award presented

G. Padmanabhan, biotechnologist and former director of the Indian Institute of Science, said at the inauguration of the conference that Kerala should tap its potential through centres of excellence in biotechnology.

Prof. Padmanabhan also received the M.V. Pylee Award for biotechnologists from Philip Augustine, Managing Director of Lakeshore Hospital, here.

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