More grants for institutional cooperation with Brazil

Two University of Groningen researchers have been granted financial support from the Brazilian government to strengthen collaboration with their Brazilian partner.

BRANETEC grant in Computing Science

Prof. Alex Telea of the department of Computing Science and his colleague Prof. Marcelo Walter of the Institute of Informatics of the Universidade Federal de Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS) have been awarded a BRANETEC grant for their “Smart Interactive Imaging System” project that provides for undergraduate and staff mobility. Up to ten Brazilian students may annually benefit from financial support to spend one year of their degree at Groningen. Senior staff visits are scheduled to additionally increase joint teaching and research activities.

BRANETEC is the Brazilian-Dutch program for cooperation in Engineering and Technology. It is financed by the Ministry of Education (CAPES) in Brazil and coordinated on the Dutch side by Nuffic.

Science without Borders grant in Nuclear Medicine

Dr. Erik de Vries of the Department of Nuclear Medicine of the University Medical Center Groningen has been awarded a visiting researcher grant for collaboration with his colleague Prof. Carlos Buchpiguel of the Universidade de S ão Paulo (USP). Over the next three years, Dr. de Vries will spend one month every year at USP to further develop different research and teaching activities. An additional number of PhD and postdoctoral visits is foreseen, as well as that bench fees will be made available.

Science without Borders is a large investment in the Brazilian knowledge economy. The program was launched in 2011 to award 100,000 scholarships for Brazilian undergraduates, PhD students and postdoctoral researchers over a period of four years. The modality for Visiting Researchers is to attract renowned foreign academics to Brazil to strengthen institutional collaboration and import expert knowledge.

The University of Groningen considers is of strategic importance to foster institutional research collaboration with Brazilian partners. Since 2012, four other Visiting Researcher Grants have been awarded to improve cooperation between Groningen and Brazil: Prof. Truuske de Bock (epidemiological oncology); Prof. Paris Avgeriou (computing science); and Dr. Marco Harmsen (medical microbiology) for collaboration with USP, and Prof. Harrie Kampinga (cell biology) with his counterpart at UFRGS.

More information:

• Science without Borders and Groningen: www.rug.nl/swb
• Latin America and Groningen: Joyce Fongers