The UT Austin Portugal Program is a partnership between the Foundation for Science and Technology and the University of Texas – Austin.
After 16 years working on the internationalization of Portuguese science, the UT Austin Portugal Program will organize another edition of its annual conference, on October 24. The International Iberian Nanotechnology Laboratory (INL), in Braga, will host the event and welcome more than 20 national and international speakers to address the theme “Modelling the Future”.
On October 24, the UT Austin Portugal Program will explore the future of the International Partnership, which is approaching the end of the third phase, completing 16 years of activity. The event will focus on research and development opportunities in clean energy; contributions of nanotechnology to the Programme’s mission; the importance of advanced computing infrastructures for science and innovation, and the future of scientific and technological cooperation between the European Union and the U.S.A.
The Program has contributed to scientific and technological progress in crucial areas: Medical Physics, Advanced Computing, Nanotechnology and Space-Earth Interactions, supporting research and development projects with high potential, whose results address worldwide social challenges. Andreia Passos, Executive Director of the UT Austin Portugal Program, believes that the success of the Program is demonstrated “by the way it promotes significantly relevant research projects – bringing together the Academia and Industry, with real impact on the development of society -, while emphasising the quality of research actions carried out in Portugal”.
“The Program has been supporting several projects in key areas: health, energy, competitiveness and sustainability of the industry, monitoring of climate change, digitalisation or development of therapies for cancer treatment – while leveraging ideas, promoting collaborative work, and advancing the Portuguese scientific and technological ecosystem”, mentioned Andreia Passos.
Dedicated to the theme “Modelling the Future”, the event – which is the largest annual event of the Program – is an opportunity to explore the Program’s role in defining the future of Portugal, as it approaches the end of its third phase.
“It is important to analyse and discuss the Program’s achievements and how they can lead to the design of scientific actions for the most urgent social problems”, said Andreia Passos, stressing that: “although one could consider 16 years as a long time to benefit from return on investment with public resources, the truth is that we must remember that international and collaborative research endeavors take a long time to establish. It is necessary to build trust and communication to generate results. Impactful changes in science and technology do not happen overnight”.
Registration for the conference is open until October 17, and the Organising Committee is expecting a significant participation by the scientific, academia and business communities.
For more information about the UT Austin Portugal Program Annual Conference – including registration details and full schedule -, please visit the Program’s official website.
The media that seeks to attend must fill out the form available here, so they can have proper authorization to enter the venue.
About the UT Austin Portugal Program
This year, the UT Austin Portugal Program – a partnership between the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) and the University of Texas at Austin, within the scope of the Portuguese Government’s initiative GoPORTUGAL (Global Science and Technology Partnerships Portugal) – celebrates 16 years. Coordinated by INESC TEC since 2018, the Program aims to promote knowledge in emerging areas of Science and Technology, through support to research, advanced training, technology transfer and innovation.
Over the past 16 years, this partnership has contributed to the creation of a transatlantic innovation ecosystem, bringing together and promoting collaboration between universities, research institutes and companies from Portugal and the University of Texas, with a main emphasis on UT Austin.
Since its foundation in 2007, the Program has involved more than 50 institutions, more than 300 students and researchers, funded more than 70 projects along the value chain, supported the training of several technology transfer offices of academia in Portugal and the development, via international dissemination, of several scientific and technological companies including unicorns like Feedzai or Sword Health.
The Program is currently in Phase 3 (2018-2023), promoting advanced training and R&D initiatives focused on four main scientific areas: Space-Earth Interaction, Advanced Computing, Medical Physics, and Nanotechnology – plus the cross-cutting area of Technological Innovation and Entrepreneurship, which succeeds the UTEN network (University – Technology – Enterprise Network).
Since 2018, the Program has funded close to €21.9 M in exploratory and industrial research projects, on topics ranging from the development of new therapeutics for cancer, to the creation of nanomaterial-based coatings to increase the lifetime of production tools used in highly demanding industries, or the conversion of oil platforms into offshore wind power generation structures.
Porto – October 17, 2023
For further inquiries:
Elsa Carvalho
Communication UT Austin Portugal
elsa.carvalho@inesctec.pt
M +351 934 224 331
