Sixty four volunteers and enthusiasts participated in the tenth Monsoon marathon organized by the Asian Institute of Technology International School (AITIS) on 24 September 2010. Participants included students, parents and friends of the AIT community. It was more than a race for many AITIS students, as it was time for fun and frolic as they meandered through the AIT Campus. The marathon also raised 30,000 Baht which will be used to purchase materials for donation.

The UNEP Risoe Centre (URC), Denmark has engaged the Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Development in the context of Climate Change (SDCC), AIT, for implementing Technology Needs Assessment (TNA) in developing Asian countries. Two Regional Centres will serve as the focal points for adaptation and mitigation respectively. These centres in cooperation with URC will play a substantial role in providing technical support and capacity building to the national TNA teams and consultants.

While Pakistan was reeling under unprecedented floods, a young student from the Asian Institute of Technology (AIT) was busy helping hapless citizens in the hour of crisis. Mr. Furqan Ali Shaikh, a Master’s student in Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) rushed back to Sindh province of Pakistan as a volunteer of Télécoms Sans Frontière (TSF). In a span of a fortnight, he helped provide emergency telephone calling facilities to 6500 families in Hyderabad, Jamshoro and Thatta in Sindh province of Pakistan.

An alumnus of Asian Institute of Technology (AIT), Prof. Somchai Wongwises, has been judged Outstanding Lecturer 2009 in the field of Science and Technology by the Council of University Faculty Senate of Thailand (CUFST). Prof. Somchai was awarded the Outstanding Lecturer award at the CUFST’s Annual Conference 2010 “Higher Education System Reform: Is it a dream?” The conference was presided over by Prime Minister of Thailand, H.E. Mr. Abhisit Vejjajiva who delivered a special lecture on “Higher Education Reform under the atmosphere of political reform”.

Nanotechnology has applications in medical science, particularly in areas like early cancer detection, infectious disease detection, environmental monitoring and pathogen detection. It also has applications in imaging, drug delivery, hyperthermia apart from pre clinical and clinical tests to name a few. This was the view expressed by experts at the Nanotechnology Forum organized by the Center for Excellence in Nanotechnology (CoEN), at the Asian Institute of Technology on 23 September 2010.