The international partnership achieved the largest number of supported projects and attracted most of the available funding for the next 3 years, within the scope of the 2019 Call for R&TD Co-Promotion Projects.
The UT Austin Portugal Program was the best performer of the 2019 call jointly launched by COMPETE 2020, the Regional Operational Programs, Agência Nacional de Inovação (ANI), and Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) under “Go Portugal – Global Science and Technology Partnerships Portugal”, an initiative of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education.
11 out of the 25 industry-driven projects were selected under this pioneering and competitive funding solicitation – whose results were announced last week – will be carried out in the frame of the UT Austin Portugal Program, representing a financial commitment of 21,9 million euros, 40% of the total eligible public and private investment for the whole call.
“The UT Austin Portugal partnership has the largest number of supported projects, which also represents the largest slice of the allocated funding. This shows that we have managed to assemble a set of structuring projects for the country, with strong transatlantic support for business-based research and innovation, thus boosting the national economy”, said the National Director José Manuel Mendonça. “We believe that this effort will contribute to accelerating and guiding the return to activity of an important part of the national production sector – which we all want, and the country needs very urgently”, he concluded.
In partnership with entities of the National Scientific and Technological System, and research teams of the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin), a batch of highly innovative Portuguese companies, mostly SMEs, will be setting the pace and scope of ground-breaking projects that are expected to shape new services, products and processes with strong global potential over the next three years. These projects will be spanning fields as diverse as the automotive and space industries, advanced computing, health or cleantech, just to name a few.
Some of the envisaged innovations include nano satellites for earth observation; nano sensors for the rehabilitation of muscle injuries in older members of the population; monitoring solutions for climate change; new coating systems to significantly improve the life cycle and performance of cutting tools for industrial sectors; tools for the advanced management of HPC infrastructures and Big Data applications or even for the monitoring of cancer patients.
The Portuguese consortia will team up with 22 Principal Investigators (PIs) coming from different departments at UT Austin, who will coordinate the projects on the US side. The majority of the PIs involved belong to the UT Austin’s Cockrell School of Engineering, where the Program is currently established. Some of the PIs are also affiliated to internationally renowned UT-based research laboratories and R&D centers such as the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) or the MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC) as well.
When the call was launched last year, only up to 4-5 projects were expected to be supported under this joint venture. The level of excellence of the applications received led the international panel of reviewers to recommend the current eleven projects for funding, representing a proposal success rate of almost 80% for the Program.
Find out which are the projects selected in the frame of the UT Austin Portugal:
Medical Physics
TOF-PET for Proton Therapy (TPPT).: In-beam Time-of-Flight (TOF) Positron Emission Tomography (PET) for proton radiation therapy
PT Consortium:
- PETSYS ELECTRONICS – MEDICAL PET DETECTORS, S.A. (Lead Beneficiary)
- LIP, LABORATÓRIO DE INSTRUMENTAÇÃO E FÍSICA EXPERIMENTAL DE PARTICULAS-ASSOCIAÇÃO PARA A INVESTIGAÇÃO E DESENVOLVIMENTO
- INSTITUTO SUPERIOR TÉCNICO
- UNIVERSIDADE DE COIMBRA
UT Austin PIs:
- Karol Lang, College of Natural Sciences, Department of Physics
- Narayan Sahoo, Department of Radiation Physics, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center
Nanomaterials
GEMIS: Graphene-enhanced Electro-Magnetic interference Shielding
PT Consortium:
- GRAPHENEST, S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- LABORATÓRIO IBÉRICO INTERNACIONAL DE NANOTECNOLOGIA (LIN);
- UNIVERSIDADE DO MINHO.
UT Austin PIs:
- Deji Akinwande, Cockrell School of Engineering, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering;
- Brian Korgel, Cockrell School of Engineering, McKetta Department of Chemical Engineering.
ExtreMED.: Extreme Ultrashort Pulses for Advanced Medical Applications and Diagnostics
PT Consortium:
- SPHERE ULTRAFAST PHOTONICS, S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- LABORATÓRIO IBÉRICO INTERNACIONAL DE NANOTECNOLOGIA (LIN);
- UNIVERSIDADE DO PORTO.
UT Austin PIs:
- Andrew Dunn, College of Natural Sciences, Department of Biomedical Engineering;
- Adela Ben-Yakar, Cockrell School of Engineering, Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering.
NanoStim.: NanoStim – Nanomaterials for wearable-based integrated biostimulation
PT Consortium:
- INCREASE TIME, S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- UNIVERSIDADE DO MINHO;
- INSTITUTO POLITÉCNICO DE BRAGANÇA;
- IMPETUS PORTUGAL – TÊXTEIS S.A.;
- TEANDM – TECNOLOGIA, ENGENHARIA E MATERIAIS S.A.;
- NELSON AZEVEDO – TERAPIAS GLOBAIS, UNIPESSOAL LDA.
UT Austin PIs:
- George Biros, Cockrell School of Engineering, Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering, Oden Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences;
- Michael A. Cullinan, Cockrell School of Engineering, Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering.
MCTool21.: Manufacturing of cutting tools for the 21st century: from nano-scale material design to numerical process simulation
PT Consortium:
- INOVATOOLS PORTUGAL, UNIPESSOAL LDA (Lead Beneficiary);
- UNIVERSIDADE DE COIMBRA;
- UNIVERSIDADE DO MINHO.
UT Austin PIs:
- Gregory J. Rodin, Oden Institute for Computational Engineering and Sciences;
- Filippo Mangolini, Cockrell School of Engineering, Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering.
NanoCatRed.: Novel metallic NANOparticles on NANOstructured supports for oxyanion CATalytic REDuction in water
PT Consortium:
- ADVENTECH – ADVANCED ENVIRONMENTAL TECHNOLOGIES, LDA (Lead Beneficiary);
- UNIVERSIDADE DO PORTO;
- LABORATÓRIO IBÉRICO INTERNACIONAL DE NANOTECNOLOGIA (LIN).
UT Austin PIs:
- Charles J Werth, Cockrell School of Engineering, Department of Civil, Architectural, and Environmental Engineering;
- Simon M. Humphrey, College of Natural Sciences, Department of Chemistry.
Soft4Sense.: Smart Surfaces for Reliable Tooling Integration
PT Consortium:
- TEANDM – TECNOLOGIA, ENGENHARIA E MATERIAIS S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- INSTITUTO PEDRO NUNES-ASSOCIAÇÃO PARA A INOVAÇÃO E DESENVOLVIMENTO EM CIÊNCIA E TECNOLOGIA;
- LABORATÓRIO IBÉRICO INTERNACIONAL DE NANOTECNOLOGIA (LIN).
UT Austin PIs:
- Rui Huang, Cockrell School of Engineering, Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics and Center for Mechanics of Solids, Structures and Materials;
- Kenneth M. Liechti, Cockrell School of Engineering, Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics and Center for Mechanics of Solids, Structures and Materials.
Advanced Computing
BigHPC.: A Management Framework for Consolidated Big Data and HPC
PT Consortium:
- WAVECOM – SOLUÇÕES RÁDIO S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- INESC TEC – INSTITUTO DE ENGENHARIA DE SISTEMAS E COMPUTADORES, TECNOLOGIA E CIÊNCIA;
- LIP, LABORATÓRIO DE INSTRUMENTAÇÃO E FÍSICA EXPERIMENTAL DE PARTICULAS-ASSOCIAÇÃO PARA A INVESTIGAÇÃO E DESENVOLVIMENTO;
- LIP, LABORATÓRIO DE INSTRUMENTAÇÃO E FÍSICA EXPERIMENTAL DE PARTICULAS-ASSOCIAÇÃO PARA A INVESTIGAÇÃO E DESENVOLVIMENTO.
UT Austin PIs:
- Vijay Chidambaram, Department of Computer Science;
- Todd Evans, Texas Advanced Computing Center.
Nanomaterials and Advanced Computing
SENTINEL.: Novel injectable biosensor for continuous remote monitoring of cancer patients at high-risk of relapse
PT Consortium:
- STEMMATTERS – BIOTECNOLOGIA E MEDICINA REGENERATIVA S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- LABORATÓRIO IBÉRICO INTERNACIONAL DE NANOTECNOLOGIA (LIN);
- UNIVERSIDADE DO MINHO;
- CCAB – CENTRO CLÍNICO ACADÉMICO – BRAGA, ASSOCIAÇÃO.
UT Austin PIs:
- Thomas Milner, Cockrell School of Engineering, Department of Biomedical Engineering;
- James Tunnel, Cockrell School of Engineering, Department of Biomedical Engineering.
Space-Earth Interactions
uPGRADE.: miniaturized Prototype for GRavity field Assessment using Distributed Earth-orbiting assets
PT Consortium:
- SPIN.WORKS S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- LABORATÓRIO IBÉRICO INTERNACIONAL DE NANOTECNOLOGIA (LIN);
- INSTITUTO DE SOLDADURA E QUALIDADE;
- INSTITUTO DE SOLDADURA E QUALIDADE;
- UNIVERSIDADE DO MINHO.
UT Austin PIs:
- Byron Tapley, Cockrell School of Engineering, Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics Department and Center for Space Research;
- Brandon Jones, Cockrell School of Engineering, Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics Department and Texas Spacecraft Laboratory.
MAGAL Constellation.: Setting the cornerstone of a future ocean and climate change monitoring constellation, based on radar altimeter data combined with gravity and ocean temperature and salinity measurements
PT Consortium
- EFACEC ENERGIA – MÁQUINAS E EQUIPAMENTOS ELÉCTRICOS S.A. (Lead Beneficiary);
- CEIIA – CENTRO DE ENGENHARIA E DESENVOLVIMENTO (ASSOCIAÇÃO);
- OMNIDEA LDA;
- CIIMAR – CENTRO INTERDISCIPLINAR DE INVESTIGAÇÃO MARINHA E AMBIENTAL;
- INSTITUTO SUPERIOR TÉCNICO;
- INSTITUTO DE TELECOMUNICAÇÕES;
- UNIVERSIDADE DA BEIRA INTERIOR;
- +ATLANTIC, ASSOCIAÇÃO PARA UM LABORATÓRIO COLABORATIVO DO ATLÂNTICO.
UT Austin PIs:
- Byron D. Tapley, Cockrell School of Engineering, Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics Department, Center for Space Research;
- Patrick Heimbach, Cockrell School of Engineering, Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics Department, Center for Space Research.
