The institutional research landscape in Portugal promoted and funded by Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) has a total 312 Research and Development Units which constitute the core of the national scientific and technological system, working in all scientific domains and spreading over the national territory. These units gather the best critical capacities in each area and attract top talents to work in a stimulating environment that promotes scientific careers and advanced training.
Aligned with the intrinsic nature of Portugal as a maritime nation, with clear strategic goals for the Atlantic Ocean as set out in the Portuguese National Sea Strategy (2021-2030), FCT supports seven R&D Units, exclusively dedicated to Marine and Maritime issues, each of them contributing to the All-Atlantic Ocean Research and Innovation Alliance (AAORIA) priority themes and goals, through different resources:
For example, CIIMAR is actively involved in partnerships, public engagement and literacy activities, building a shared understanding and valorisation of the ocean and providing services to the scientific community; MARE contributes to various international networks and working groups such as GESAMP-UN, the Smithsonian MarineGEO network, the ICES Working group, among others; OKEANOS studies the marine living resources in the Azores, employing various infrastructures, such as DEEP SEA Lab (RAS for deep-sea fauna research) or Research Vessels (NI Arquipélago; LI Águas-Vivas; RIBs) ; CENTEC develops cutting edge Marine Technologies for various ends such as modelling of oil pollution at sea, offshore renewable energies, autonomous vehicles for ocean observation, among others; CCMAR Algarve is actively involved in international partnerships and provides several research services to the Atlantic Community; UAlg CIMA contributes with different activities to data sharing, capacity building, ocean literacy and knowledge transfer; CESAM is involved in several international networks and collaborative activities such as the COBI repositor, the Marine mammals tissue bank, the IOC-UNESCO Ocean Teachers Global Academy, among others, and has the co-coordination of Challenger 150, UN Decade of Ocean Science.
Want to know more? We invite you to download the leaflets of the seven Marine and Maritime Portuguese R&D Units and learn more about their specific competences and contributions to the AAORIA: CIIMAR, MARE, OKEANOS, CENTEC, CCMAR Algarve , UAlg CIMA and CESAM.
