Atlas of Associate Laboratories

FCT presented the Atlas of Associate Laboratories (Atlas of Associate Laboratories 2022) during the conference "25 years of FCT in Science: Scientific Employment and Scientific Careers", held at the University of Coimbra on March 31. This conference was part of the 25 years of FCTThe conference was part of the FCT's 25th anniversary program, made up of 12 scientific sessions addressing important issues for the future of science in Portugal and Europe.

The Atlas of Associate Laboratories (AL) is an FCT publication that gathers information on the 40 institutions or consortia of institutions that have been awarded Associate Laboratory status. It presents data on the area of activity of the ALs, the work carried out, the number of PhD researchers, among other things. This Call established the allocation of complementary funding for the specific activities of the ALs of €23,843,000 per year, starting in 2021 and for a period of 5 years, which is in addition to the funding of €53,469,000 per year already granted to the Research Units that are part of the LA. The results are available here and the evaluation reports here.

The laboratories are structural components of the National Scientific and Technological System (SCTN) and consist of research and development (R&D) institutions or consortia of R&D institutions, which make explicit institutional commitments to the pursuit of national scientific and technological policy objectives. To this end, these laboratories must have a dimension of human resources and scientific infrastructure that allows them to sustainably promote scientific and technical careers for doctoral graduates.

Started in 2019, the process of granting LA status was prepared and conducted by the FCT with criteria of transparency and the involvement of the scientific community, in which extensive informal discussions were held on the regulations of the process, culminating in a public discussion and publication of the Associate Laboratories Regulation on November 12, 2019.

The application process for this Call is open permanently, with a single annual evaluation period. The evaluated applications were submitted between September 28 and October 29, 2020. R&D Units funded by FCT, with an Excellent or Very Good rating and with a minimum of 80 integrated doctoral researchers at the time of the application, could apply individually or in consortium. 45 applications were submitted, covering a total of 118 Units and 10,088 integrated researchers. The evaluation was conducted by a national panelcoordinated by Manuel Nunes da Ponte and with the collaboration of an international scientific council. All applications were presented and discussed publicly. (videos of the sessions).

This publication adds to the Atlas of R&D Unitsan FCT publication launched in January, which gathers information on the 312 R&D Units selected for funding in the latest FCT evaluation process for the 2020-2023 period.