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BIST receives three post-doctoral fellowships from Fundació Bosch Aymerich

By May 11, 2020January 4th, 2021Press Release, BIST

• The Bosch Aymerich Foundation will support the FBA Fellows Programme with an endowment of one million euros.

• The Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (BIST) and the International University of Catalonia (UIC Barcelona), beneficiaries of the programme, will be opening calls for applications soon for a total of six open positions, three at each institution.

The Bosch Aymerich Foundation, created by the engineer, architect, and businessman Josep Maria Bosch Aymerich (Girona 1917 – Barcelona 2015) and his wife, M. Rosa Escarpenter, will support the new FBA Fellows Programme, which aims to attract new scientific talent. The Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (BIST) and the International University of Catalonia (UIC Barcelona) will be the beneficiary institutes for the programme, with each taking on three fellows who will carry out research and teaching work over the next three years.

The agreement signed by the Bosch Aymerich Foundation, BIST, and UIC Barcelona aims to boost research and teaching excellence in the field of health (precision medicine in particular) and the environment (especially energy and sustainability). Our society today faces complex challenges in these areas, with the health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic being a good example. Addressing these challenges requires a transversal and multidisciplinary perspective in order to drive frontier research and improve the training of new generations of researchers and professionals. The Bosch Aymerich Foundation strives towards helping generate the necessary synergies.

A big part of the research done at BIST revolves precisely around two of the fundamental and interrelated global challenges in today’s society: human health and sustainability in energy and the environment.

Through the use of genomics, bioinformatics, nanotechnology, and other advanced experimental techniques, BIST will address the challenge of advancing precision medicine (beginning with the in-depth study of high-impact pathologies such as cancer and metastasis or those related to aging) with a complete global view of the individual/patient. BIST will also tackle challenges related to the environment through focusing on the causes of environmental deterioration and climate change. We will focus specifically on four areas: direct conversion of sunlight into electricity using photovoltaic devices, artificial photosynthesis, new techniques for monitoring air, water and food quality, and CO2 capture and use.

UIC Barcelona brings to the table two faculties of medicine and dentistry. Fifty-four percent of UIC Barcelona students study health sciences, and 11 of its 25 recognized research groups also fall within the field. Health sciences research at UIC Barcelona is focused on areas such as biomaterials, tissue regeneration, aging, metabolism, physiotherapy, and health policies, among others.

UIC Barcelona also has seven combined company-university chairs which drive its collaborations with the private sector in the field of health.

What is more, aware of the progressive and unsustainable urbanization of the planet, research in sustainability and resilience is a growing priority for the UIC Barcelona School of Architecture. The school has two research groups: one focusing on genetic architecture and community-based urbanism, and the other a research laboratory working on technological innovation in industrial and sustainable construction. There are also plans to set up a research institute for sustainable architecture and urbanism.

For UIC Barcelona, this collaboration is a great opportunity to attract the best research talent and integrate new members into its excellent teaching programme within its tenure track model.

FBA Fellows will be recruited through two calls launched by UIC Barcelona and BIST in the coming weeks. The six new fellows are expected to start their positions between September and December of this year.

 

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