Universidade Católica Portuguesa and the Champalimaud Foundation have signed a strategic collaboration agreement aimed at strengthening biomedical research and advanced training in Portugal.
As part of this partnership, the Católica Biomedical Research Centre (CBR) – the biomedical research centre at Universidade Católica, recently rated “Excellent” by the Foundation for Science and Technology – will move to the Champalimaud Foundation in Lisbon, giving its students and researchers access to the Champalimaud Clinical Centre facilities.
The integration of part of the CBR's scientific activities into the Champalimaud Foundation's research environment will bring university research closer to one of the most advanced scientific infrastructures in the country, strengthen collaboration between researchers from both institutions, and develop joint initiatives and basic scientific projects.
As a result, the CBR will now operate in two complementary research centres – Lisbon and Oeiras – strengthening the link between fundamental research and clinical application. The centre's clinical and translational research activity will continue to be developed in Oeiras, within the scope of the collaboration between Católica and Luz Saúde, through the Católica–Luz Academic Clinical Centre.
For the President of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Isabel Capeloa Gil, the agreement represents a strategic step towards strengthening the university's scientific capacity. "This collaboration with the Champalimaud Foundation represents an innovative model of cooperation between a university and a leading biomedical research institution. By bringing together researchers, scientific infrastructure and advanced training, we are creating new conditions for developing scientific excellence in Portugal," she says.
The new scientific hub in Lisbon will gradually be able to accommodate up to 200 researchers, organised into groups led by principal investigators and dedicated to studying diseases and the fundamental biological mechanisms underlying them.
The development of this new scientific infrastructure will be accompanied by a joint investment of around five million euros, shared between the two institutions, aimed at strengthening laboratory infrastructure and acquiring advanced scientific equipment to support the CBR's fundamental research activities.
“This is an investment that brings together an academic institution and a fusion research institution with real cases that need immediate solutions,” says João Silveira Botelho, vice-president of the Champalimaud Foundation. “The experience of our researchers, combined with the academic knowledge of the students and a multidisciplinary environment, will certainly be an asset to cancer research and treatment and neuroscience,” he adds.
Through this collaboration, the Universidade Católica Portuguesa and the Champalimaud Foundation will also make a significant contribution to establishing Lisbon as an international hub for biomedical research and interdisciplinary science.
