The University of Minho receives conference of the UT Austin Portugal Program

September 18, 2019. The UT Austin Portugal Program organizes the 2019 Annual Conference at the University of Minho, on September 20. Professor Robert A. Peterson, the originator of the supercomputer in Portugal, will be present at the initiative.

The University of Minho hosts on Friday, 20 September, the Annual Conference of the UT Austin Portugal Annual Program on the theme “Create Knowledge. Foster Change: Towards a New Decade of Joint Achievements”. The sessions are addressed to the entire academic, research and business community in the country and will take place in the auditorium of the School of Economics and Management, at the Gualtar campus in Braga.

The conference, which will be attended by 140 experts, brings Robert A. Peterson, of the University of Texas at Austin, to Portugal for the plenary session. Peterson is the great promoter of the initiative that gave Portugal and the Minho Advanced Computing Center (MACC) their first supercomputer, which was named BOB, in his honor.

The opening session will take place at 10:30 AM and will include the interventions of the Rector Rui Vieira de Castro, the Minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education (MCTES), Manuel Heitor, the National Director of the UT Austin Portugal Program, José Manuel Mendonça, and the Member of the Board of Directors of the Portuguese Science and Technology Foundation (FCT), Nuno Feixa Rodrigues.Two thematic masterclasses are also the highlight in the event’s agenda. The first masterclass will address Quantum Computing and the second one will focus on Nanomaterials in the context of smart textiles. These two moments will be held in the building of the Institute of Science and Innovation for Bio-sustainability (IB-S) and will be conducted by experts from research institutions in Portugal, UT Austin and Germany.

At the same time, at Restaurante Panorâmico of the University of Minho, a poster exhibition will take place, during which R&D projects will be presented, covering the five areas of expertise of the Program (Advanced Computing, Medical Physics, Nanotechnologies, Space-Earth Interactions and Technological Innovation and Entrepreneurship).

UT Austin Portugal Program stimulates international collaboration between researchers, professors, students and companies

The National Co-director of the UT Austin Portugal Program is the Professor of the Department of Informatics, Rui Oliveira. Since 2018, the Program is under INESC TEC’s management, and the University of Minho is one of its associates. Since 2007, its goal has been to promote new frontiers of knowledge on emerging issues around the world with the development of education and research activities and the commercialization of high-level technology, and results from a partnership between FCT and The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin), supported by MCTES, in collaboration with the Council of Rectors of Portuguese Universities (CRUP).

The program intends to stimulate and strengthen the effective collaboration between researchers, professors, students and companies through collaborative R&D projects and high-level education and training opportunities, thus promoting and enabling a deeper involvement in the multidisciplinary network between Portugal and the ecosystem of the University of Texas.

 

For more information:

Daniel Vieira da Silva
Communication, Information and Image Office
www.uminho.pt/

This press was released by the University of Minho and translated by the UT Austin Portugal Program.