Governor Linda Lingle has announced a new Hawai'i-Taiwan joint partnership in undergraduate education, community outreach and astronomy research stemming from the Taiwan-American Occultation Survey.

The agreement between the Academia Sinica and the University of Hawai'i – Hilo was signed by UH Hilo Chancellor Rose Tseng during the Governor's trip to Taiwan.

The partnership will facilitate the enhancement of current TAOS research capabilities in Hawai'i and initiate reciprocal educational, outreach, and research programs.

The purpose of the TAOS project is to measure directly the number of Kuiper Belt Objects in the outer solar system. This knowledge will help scientists to understand the formation and evolution of comets in the early solar system.

The current president of Academia Sinica is Dr.Yuan-Tseh Lee, a Nobel laureate in chemistry in 1986, who was inaugurated on January 15,1994, with Dr. Michael M. C. Lia and Dr. Tsui-jung Liu  and Dr. Ovid J. L. Tzeng serving as vice presidents.