Prof. Dermot Diamond visited Brazil as part of the Government Trade Mission and the SFI/Enterprise Ireland delegation from the 6th – 12th October 2012. During the visit, Prof. Diamond attended multiple meetings, and presented a talk entitled ‘Building Strategic Brazil-Ireland Research Partnerships: From initial steps to Strategic Engagement’. at the SFI Innovation Ireland Showcase Event ‘Celebrating the Success of Partnership and Forging Relationships for a New Generation of Scientists and Engineers’ at the University of Sao Paulo on 8th October 2012. On the same day he attended the Science without Borders call launch and breakfast Network Reception at the Tivoli Hotel, October 8th.

On the 12th October, Prof. Diamond met with Daniel Diaz, Director of IBM Research, Sao Paulo, and a team of his senior researchers. As a result of this meeting it is hoped that researchers at DCU will work together with IBM Research Ireland to explore mechanisms to work together in the areas of natural resources, specifically water, oil and gas. In particular, the ways in which IBM can participate locally (within Ireland) and between Ireland/Brazil, will be examined.

NCSR is currently collaborating with Prof. Ernane Costa from the University of Sao Paulo (USP). Current research with Prof. Costa is going very well and this collaboration made a big impact when presented at the meetings. This work is being carried out in conjunction with the public utility company SABESP and is focused on monitoring of gas emissions during anaerobic digestion of waste water.

The USP team have deployed one of the DCU developed CH4/CO2 autonomous monitoring systems (Figure 1) and the resulting data can be accessed via Google Fusion Tables from any location worldwide. The data is generating new information about the water treatment pond, with CH4 levels rising towards explosive levels at almost 18% and CO2 appearing to present a daily cyclical behaviour (see figure 2 below).