On 21 August 2024, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research and the Ministry of Science and Technology of People’s Republic of China (PRC) signed an agreement at the House of the Government of the Russian Federation. The document was signed alongside the 29th Regular Meeting between Chinese and Russian Heads of Governments. The aim of the new agreement is to develop cooperation between JINR and China in fundamental research, facilitate personnel exchange, and expand research opportunities.

The document provides for JINR and the Ministry of Science of China to jointly finance collaborative fundamental research projects at large scientific facilities. The parties identified eight joint projects in neutrino physics, theoretical and nuclear physics, research and development of microcircuits and detector technologies, the synthesis of new elements, and the study of chemical properties of superheavy elements.

Tsinghua University and Central China Normal University will cooperate with JINR as part of these projects, along with a number of institutes of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, including Institute of Theoretical Physics, Institute of High Energy Physics, and Institute of Modern Physics.

“China has enormous research potential and plays a leading role in the global science. The Joint Institute for Nuclear Research has always been at the forefront of a number of scientific fields. The agreement signed today will allow us to work towards practical results together and achieve synergy,” said JINR Vice-Director Vladimir Kekelidze, who signed the document on JINR’s behalf.

On the Chinese side, the agreement was signed by Minister of Science and Technology of China Yin Hejun. Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin and Premier of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China Li Qiang attended the ceremony.

“We are pleased with the significant intensification of our scientific cooperation with the People’s Republic of China. It is a great honour for us to sign this agreement in the presence of the Heads of Governments of China and Russia, the home country of our international organization. I believe that there is also a great symbolic significance in this. This is the strategic trust that science is receiving today. This, of course, is inspiring for JINR and Chinese researchers.

This document shows that our joint work is reaching a qualitatively new level. We will certainly be glad to take the next step, fully reuniting PRC with the international scientific family of JINR,” Vladimir Kekelidze stressed.

The agreement is the next stage of the gradual development of cooperation between JINR and the People’s Republic of China and the result of the second meeting of the JINR-China Joint Coordination Committee on Cooperation, held in Shanghai this July. Joint work is carried out under the quadripartite protocol between the Ministry of Science and Higher Education of Russia, the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, and the Chinese Academy of Sciences on strengthening cooperation in fundamental research, signed in March 2023.

Earlier in 2020, an agreement was signed between the Ministry of Science and Technology of the People’s Republic of China and JINR on China’s participation in the construction and operation of the NICA Complex. Under this agreement, the parties developed detectors for the NICA Project, worked in accelerator physics and technology, and created superconducting accelerator elements. In addition to these works, a 3 MJ superconducting energy storage device was engineered for the needs of the electric power industry.