Five individuals awarded the Medal of Scientific Merit

The Minister for Science, Technology and Higher Education, Manuel Heitor, recently distinguished five more personalities with the Medal of Scientific Merit. The recipients were Luís Magalhães, Paulo Ferrão, Helena Pereira, Emília Moura and Isabel Vitorino. The aim of this award is to recognize national or foreign individuals who have made a valuable and exceptional contribution to the development of science or scientific culture in Portugal due to their high professional qualities and performance of duty.

Below is a brief biographical note on the academic, scientific and/or professional career of the most recent winners.

Luís Magalhães, who holds a PhD in Applied Mathematics from Brown University (USA), is currently a full professor of Mathematics at Instituto Superior Técnico, where he co-founded two research centers, the Center for Mathematical Analysis and the Institute of Systems and Robotics. He was president of FCT between 1997 and 2002 and of the Knowledge Society Agency (UMIC), whose functions were later integrated into FCT, between 2005 and 2012. Since 2017, he has also been vice-chairman of the OECD's Committee on Digital Economy Policy (CDEP).

Paulo Ferrão, who holds a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Instituto Superior Técnico, is the current president of the COST association, an EU program for scientific and technological cooperation, and a full professor at IST. His scientific output has focused mainly on urban sustainability and smart cities, and he is also president of IST's Center for Studies in Innovation, Technology and Development Policies. He was also director of the MIT-Portugal Program between 1996 and 2016, and president of FCT between 2016 and 2019.

Helena Pereira, a full professor at the Instituto Superior de Agronomia, has held academic and scientific management and coordination positions at various universities, polytechnic institutes and research units. Her research has focused mainly on forests and forest products. Since 2019, he has held the position of President of the FCT Board of Directors.

Emília Moura, who has a degree in Economics from the Instituto Superior de Economia e Gestão (ISEG) of the University of Lisbon, is currently a member of FCT's Board of Directors. Her career in Public Administration has involved her in the direction, management and coordination of Ministerial Offices in the area of Science, Technology and Higher Education, the European Social Fund Coordination Commission, and the Foundation for National Scientific Computation (FCCN), highlighting the positions of Director of the Department of Management and Administration of FCT, between 2009 and 2015, and Head of the Office of Science, Technology and Higher Education of the XXI Government of Portugal, between 2016 and 2019.

Isabel Vitorino has been head of FCT's Department for Supporting Institutions since 2008. She has held various positions in the management of national science and technology, most notably at the Junta Nacional de Investigação Científica e Tecnológica (JNICT), where she joined in 1987, with management duties in the area of awarding and monitoring research Studentships for the S&T Mobilizer Program, and where she was also coordinator of the area of financial management and budgetary control of programs and projects, and coordination of the process of evaluating R&D Units in 2007.

To find out more about the previous recipients of the Medal of Scientific Merit, see the awards page.