The University of Algarve aims to carry out research and education in advanced sciences and reinforce the interaction between the university and regional institutions. With approximately 10000 students, 700 faculty and a diverse range of undergraduate and graduate programs, it has evolved since its inception to become an international reference in several areas and, in the latest years, in biomedical research. At UAlg, the biomedical research is spearheaded by researchers from the CBMR, with the participation of researchers from the CCMAR/CIMAR LA. Together, the researchers of each of these centers created, at UALG, a strong research core in biomedical sciences, composed by research in embryonic development, cell therapies, animal models of disease and systems biology. This biomedical core, together with the new Medical school, was put together in recent years to address the need for both new therapeutic strategies and improved interactions between research developments and medicine. Researchers from CBMR at UAlg are also part of the UAlg‘s Departamento de Ciências Biomédicas e Medicina both as professors and as supervisors of PhD candidates. These programmes were structured to cross-expose candidates from both programmes to relevant aspects of each field. Being a higher education institution that awards graduate degrees, the University has in place all the necessary and relevant infrastructures and human resources for this programme. Moreover, the University has, over the last decade, been allocating increasing resources to I&D activities, including facilities designated for research that cover an extensive area of its main campus. These research facilities, organized in both core facilities and individual facilities, are fully equipped to carry out research activities within the biomedical field. The core facilities encompass cell imaging, flow cytometry, animal facilities and imaging, molecular biology and gene expression facilities. These infrastructures have greatly contributed for the excellent rating that the IBB-CBME has consistently achieved within FCT, as well as an excellent track record both in terms of publications as well as advanced training of students.
The IBB-CBME researchers have several collaborations with researchers within the field of this proposal as well as with researchers from chemistry, marine biology, physics, among others, both at the national and international level, who have led to both joint supervision of undergraduate and graduate students as well peer-reviewed publications.