Concept of the Project
After signing the grant agreement for the project, the European Commission nominated 3 external experts to evaluate the nanoscale materials characterization capacities at Sabanci University (SU). Prof. Dr. A. Cuneyt Tas of Yeditepe University was specifically selected from Turkey, representing an understanding of the local context. The other two international experts also had professional backgrounds directly relevant to evaluating the operation of a center for nanoscale materials characterization. Each evaluator had developed a strong career through stints in a variety of research facilities and cultures. Prof. Esko Kauppinen of the Helsinki University of Technology had recently participated in an effort by ~10 research groups/departments to found jointly a Center for Nanoscience Research funded by a 10 million Euro national grant. Prof. Dr. Anthimos Georgiadis of Leuphana-Lueneberg University, while a junior faculty member, had contributed to the development of FORTH in Crete, during the early years of the institute; while more recently he has also served as the Dean of Engineering Leuphana University, which, similar to SU, is a small private university.
To prepare the evaluators, a background overview report was prepared by all of the faculty members participating in SUMCL. This report summarized the research activities that were both on-going and in the incubation phase, as well as the backgrounds of the researchers, the funding types and levels, collaborations, and available infrastructure. This report was the first deliverable of the project, D1.
The evaluation visit, Milestone 1 (M1), took place on November 5th-8th, 2009. Many researchers, both faculty and early researchers, presented their research activities and candidly discussed their perspective of the research environment at SU. Milestone 2 (M2) was the SWOT analysis of the nanoscale materials characterization capacities at SU, generated by the evaluators afterwards and submitted to SU. Based on this SWOT analysis, the Executive Board of the Materials Characterization Lab at SU drafted an action plan for improvement, which served as the 3rd milestone of the project, M3. This action plan, combined with the SWOT analysis, served as the second deliverable of the project, D2. Approval of the action plan by all participants of SUMCL was the final milestone of the project, M4.
The project activity flowchart below summarizes the relation between key milestones and deliverables with the main tasks of the workplan.
