ANNUAL REPORT
2011 www.ualg.pt
MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR On January 13, 2012 (that could only be a Friday!), around diner time, the cruising ship Costa Concordia, with 4.252 on board, hits a submerged rock nearby the port of Isola del Giglio off the west coast of Tuscany (Italy). After various events mainly involving the ship’s master, Francesco Schettino, the ship goes a shore in an area nearly in front of the port of Giglio in a water depth of approximately 20 m. The ship’s evacuation occurs during the night from the 13th to the 14th of January, with the assistance of the italian coast guard and the ship’s own means making however thirty three confirmed casualities. At this moment, the ship lays half submerged and heavily tilted to starboard, causing a strong visual impact taking into account the proximity to land and the heavy mass of the ship (see photograph on figure 1). A frequent concern after such disaster is the possibility of a subsequent environmental hazard due to a possible oil spill from the ship wreck. The activation of oil spill
Figure 1: Costa Concordia cruising ship a shore off the port of Giglio Island, in the west coast of Italy.
contention measures is highly dependent of a crucial information: in case of spill, to which direction is the oil suppose to drift? This is where the contribution of the team from the University of Algarve, leaded by Prof. Flávio Martins, as part of the European project Argomarine, is important. In a few days, this group produced online information of a mathematical model with an estimate of the possible drift of the oil spill based on actual
environmental information of the area. Figure 2 shows, according to the model what would be the drift of the Costa Concordia spill, if it was to happen. This results were made available on the University of Algarve webpage and on that of the Argomarine project www.argomarine.eu, and were also shown on the TV news of RTP1, main portuguese broadcast station, a few days after the disaster. All of us, at some point of our lives, have encountered persons that have left a strong impact. A teacher, a friend, a politician, an actor, a sportsman, or someone else with whom we have identified ourselves, that impressed on us, and that has eventually modified our own way of thinking, of behaving and, who knows, even our own life path. Matt Cimber represents such person, with a strong charisma that stimulates and gives example for those attracted by arts and communication. Its visit to the University of Algarve in October 2011 (figure 3), where he gave a lecture on “Film director for beginers and professionals”, as a joint organisation of the Research Centre in Arts and Communication (CIAC), the Faculty of Social and Human Sciences (FCHS) and the Algarve Film Commission, was clearly marked in the agenda of artistic and film fan regional and national community. The participants had the opportunity to write scripts for movies, documentaries and TV as well as to develop individual abilities with improvising and character construction exercises. Synergies were created among various workshop attendees with diverse talents and formations in the area of film direction and individual projects are being developed. Without any overstatement one can say that Matt Cimber seeds film directors everywhere he goes, as long as the "soil" is fertile and, apparently, Matt Cimber thinks the "soil" in Algarve is fertile since he stated that "...in the Algarve there is much talent to make movies, that is only waiting for the right opportunity to be revealed". Likewise in previous years also in 2011 the researchers at UAlg have made significant contributions for the advance of Science in their various areas of work. There were not only significant contributions to Science but also, not least important, contributions to society. Respond to concrete problems on societal, environmental or technological
relevant aspects is the essence of the existance of an University that establishes strong links with the sorrounding society. This, almost immediate interest of research results (as for example the case of Costa Concordia) has a significant impact in the citizen, but is often disregarded by the scientific community. Sometimes we have the feeling that our world has sudnely changed during 2011. Suddenly what we had admitted and acquired for so many years was no longer valid. The level of exigence suddenly increased to levels never reached before and, taking into account the actual financial restrictions, the conditions to access such levels are now limited. Our fragilities and unreadiness for most exigent situations are now apparent. In this situation it is necessary to close ranks, to prepare strategies, potentialize and optimize resources. It was in this highly challenging climate that UAlg has decided, at the end of 2011, to define institutional strategic areas - named as anchor areas - in order to concentrate effort and resources in those areas that the "University knows to do better". The thematic of the anchor areas is now being discussed in the academic community, whereas four main candidate areas have been proposed: "the ocean", "health, nutrition and wellfare", "arts and heritage"and "tourism".
20/January/2012, 00:00 GMT
Figure 2: oil spill model output for the Costa Concordia environmental area conditions at January 20, 2012.
One of the first requirements in the selection of a anchor area is its research and advanced teaching potential in UAlg relative to other areas and to other universities in Portugal. Its level of internationalization, as an indicator of quality and sustainability, is also an important factor, as well as its social, economical and strategic relevance for the country. In the view of anchor areas, the other areas of knowledge existing in the University are seen as horizontal thrusts feeding and potentializing the anchor areas. It is common place to say that affirmation is obtained through quality. This is even more so in the current difficult times. The University of Algarve has a continuying bet on the quality of its research as well as that of its graduate teching increasing the number of proposals, gaining international renowed projects and attracting the best students and researchers for its laboratories and research centres. Our perspective is that the way out from this period can only be by the top and this is how UAlg will come out of it: stronger and more competitive.
Figura 3: Matt Cimber giving its lecture at University of Algarve.
SĂŠrgio M. Machado Jesus Vice-Rector for Research University of Algarve, June 2012
The visualization of the project lifecycle within the University crosses the existing project management experience with the 速 SAP methodology, that adopts the notion of lifecycle as the basis for the design of macro process flowcharts.
ACTIVITIES WITH LARGER IMPACT The impact of SIGESTUALG in research management In 2011, important steps were made toward the implementation of the shared resources management platform of the University of Algarve (SIGESTUALG). This implementation reached the approval of the UAlg BBP (Business Blueprint) in July 2011. This platform, based on the well known SAPÂŽ information system, is composed of three main modules: financial management, human resources and project management. The later is the module with the greatest impact on research project management since it directly implements the flowchart that describes the lifecycle of a project within the University, since its early proposal stage until its closing date and archival of results (see figure 4).
institution. The structuring of the proposal process is also important in activities where there is no pre-defined procedure, as for example for contracting. Apart from a better management control, a more detailed information to the researchers and a better reporting capacity, the integration with the human resources module, now covering all researchers and fellowships’ grantees of the University, will allow for a better management of the research team and allocation of time across all the resources of the University. This integrated view of human resources allocation is now a requirement for a number of funding agencies. At the time of writing of this report, the migration phase of all active projects in 2012 from the old to the new system is terminated and is ready for interaction
Figure 4: SIGESTUALG information flow chart for projects.
The visualization of the project lifecycle within the University crosses the existing project management experience with the SAPÂŽ methodology, that adopts the notion of lifecycle as the basis for the design of macro process flowcharts. Thus, the University has decided to adopt a separate approval and decision circuit, independently of the type of project or funding program. In fact, the term "project" is used here in latu sensu for any activity that uses University resources, independently from generating funding or not, covering all areas such as research projects, services, mobility, etc. One of the main novelties introduced in this system is the inclusion of the proposal phase that, at internal level, imposes collecting information with the objective of characterizing the UAlg resources required for the proposed activity as well as to determine the flux and allocation of funding necessary for its execution. Some funding agencies have structured proposal schemes (as for example FCT, FP7, etc) that are understandbly oriented toward a use of resources as seen from the funding agency to the institution, while in the SIGESTUALG the usage of resources are seen in the perspective of the proposing
with the principal investigators and research units administrative personnel. This process is now underway, bringing more flexibility and management control to the administration as well as to the research community. The UAlg R&D network The first phase of the installation and ratification of the UAlg R&D unit (RDU) network is now nearly terminated. This phase, that went on during the last eighteen months, resulted in the ratification of six research centres (RC) and twelve research and development centres (RDC), complying with the statutes of the University in which regards to their characteristics and autonony for each of the typologies. Besides this phase of formal ratification, new rules and competences where established for the new RDUs, namely with the publication of the Rectoral Order RT 53/2011 complemented with RT 38/2011, in which regards research incentives and project institutional overheads. Table 1 shows all approved RDUs of the University of Algarve distributed by scientific domain. The repetition of RDUs per scientific area was avoided as much as possible in order to enhance critical mass and pluridisciplinarity.
Taking into account the inquiry to the Ualg human resources potential for research made at the end of 2010, as well as the adjustmens made with the formation of new research centres since then, the number of researchers of each RDU is shown on the third column of table 1. One can note the high percentage of researchers participating in RDUs, which attains approximately 65% of the total of 512 active researchers identified in the 2010 inquiry.
10 8 6 4 2 0 2008
2009
2010
2011
Figure 5: number of spin-offs generated from the University of Algarve in the last four years.
Technology transfer and entrepreneurship Innovation and entrepreneurship are nowadays the necessary conditions for economical development and growth, promoting competitive regions and companies. Thus, the universities, as the institutions responsible for the formation of human resources and generators of knowledge, constitute the ideal environment for innovation. Taking into account the actual restrictions of the economic system, the valorization of innovative knowledge being able to generate newproducts and services for the market, or new methodologies of work organization, configures not only an employment opportunity but also a stimulus of the economic system, creating a disruptive atitude.
The Technology Transfer and Entrepreneurship Division (CRIA) of the University of Algarve promotes the connection between the economic agents and the knowledge generated in the University, conducting to its effective promotion and valorization, thus eliminating barriers between the generation of knowledge and its transfer to the market, using methodologies of direct technology transfer or encouraging new entrepreneurs, as a form to valorize competentes and create wealth. In what relates to knowledge based entrepreneurship, CRIA actively supports new entrepreneurs in the valorization of their business ideas and on the creation of spinoffs (see Number of Acronym Researchers
Scientific Area
Name
Mathematics
Centre for Studies and Development of Mathematics in Higher Education2 Centre of Mathematics and Physics and Theoretical Physics2 Chemistry Research Centre of the Algarve1 Plant Science Laboratories Group2 Centre for Water Science and Technology2 Centre for Marine and Environmental Science1 Centre of Marine Sciences1 Centre for Studies in Agricultural Sciences and Technologies2 Centre for Molecular and Structural Biomedecine1 .
9
CEDMES
5 22 8 14 28 33 12 23
CFMFT CIQA GLaCiP CTA CIMA CCMAR CECTA CBME
Centre for Technological Research of the Algarve2 .
19
CINTAL
Centre of Electronics, Optoelectronics and Telecommunications1 . Informatics Laboratory2 Centre for Advanced Studies in Economics and Econometrics2 .
11 8 12
CEOT ILAB CASEE
Research Centre for Spatial and Organizational Dynamics1 .
53
CIEO
University Centre for Research in Psychology2 . Centre for Studies in Language Sciences2 .
24 26
CUIP CECL
Research Centre in Arts and Communication1 .
19
CIAC
4
NAP
Physics Chemistry Biological Sciences Earth and Space Sciences Marine Sciences Agricultural Sciences Health Sciences Civil Engineering Mechanical Engineering Materials Science and Engineering Chemical and Biotechnological Engineering Eletrical and Computer Engineering Economics and Management Law and Political Sciences Sociology, Anthropology, Demography and Geography Education Sciences and Policies Psychology Language Science Communication Sciences Literary Studies Art Studies Philosophy History African Studies Total
Centre for Archaeology and Paleoecology2 .
Table 1: UAlg Research and Development Units: 1) research centres and 2) research and development centres.
326
figure 5), sistematically promoting events for entrepreneurship potential awareness, attempting to identify new entrepreneurs and businees ideas among qualified public generators of knowledge of the academic community.
approximately 60 presentations in external events, for a total of 240 hours reaching approximately 2000 attendees with the objective of supporting the creation of new companies and entrepreneurship and knowledge transfer;
In this sense CRIA supports entrepreneurs in the process of economic viability of their business ideas, since the early phase of the protection of technologies and inventions, registering patents, brands and utility models, as well as their economical and financial validation and subsequent development.
support and follow up of 92 new entrepreneurs and companies;
Along the process, and according to the specific requirements of each project, CRIA acts as support instrument and makes the link to the University knowledge centres, as well as to the attraction of funding and legal procedures required for starting a business and insertion into the commercial internal and external network. From its inception, CRIA has developed a role of promoting innovation and competitiveness in the region, acting as a link between the knowledge created in the University of Algarve and regional companies, valorizing the activities developed in the academia and promoting along the interest of interaction with the industry and the entrepreneurial potential, creating collaborative projects University-Company and new technology and knowledgebased companies. During the year of 2011, CRIA supported a number of initiatives such as:
CRIA supports entrepreneurs in the process of economic viability of their business ideas, since the early phase of the protection of technologies and inventions, registering patents, brands and utility models, as well as their economical and financial validation and subsequent development.
development of the competition "Ideas in a box 2010"(Ideias em Caixa 2010) initiated in 2010. This initiative was very well received by the academic community and regional industrial environment having generated 126 applications; in 2011 took place all the activities, workshops and seminars and follow up of the selected ideas; four new companies with UAlg origin were created; support of the local business community in the application to development funding programes (QREN, PO Algarve 21, R&D incentives, etc) for increasing competitiveness and growth. In this sense CRIA has contributed for attracting a significant amount of resources to the region. A number of these activities were performed in collaboration with teams and / or research centres of the University; six new patent requests were filled and four were registered.
RESOURCES FOR R&D AND POSTGRADUATE DEGREE Financial resources The accounting balance of R&D activities relative to 2011 shows a sustained activity in the areas of mobility and R&D projects (table 2). Carefull analysis of this information shows that the UAlg net difference (total amount deducted of the transfers to partners) between 2010 and 2011 is of approximately 950,000 euros. Income Community support & extension Inovation Institucional Mobility Contracting R&D projects R&D units Total
Expenses Human resources Researchers R&D fellowships Mobility grants Travel Goods and services Equipament Pay back/returns Transf. to partners Net balance Total
2010 453.506 565.432 608.420 2.576.421 716.687 2.448.965 662.129 8.031.560
2011 16.850 364.567 343.909 2.461.994 520.515 1.200.864 376.670 5.285.369
2010 2.443.049 386.404 1.011.003 1.045.642 604.638 1.347.607 620.919 90.656 2.067.096 857.595 8.031.560
2011 2.631.426 319.620 1.090.651 1.221.155 512.421 1.278.643 322.641 83.556 539.780 -83.098 5.285.369
2010 512.240 128.681 23.520 664.441
2011 465.073 259.244 152.357 876.674
Indirect costs Overheads (internal) Overheads (external) Mobility Total
and Technology (FCT) - the largest research funding source of UAlg - to January 2012, for an amount that largely compensates for that difference. One should also note the slightly negative net balance of circa 100,000 euros, due to this late funding transfer of FCT and a few other EU projects. Note also the inclusion in table 2 of the external funding received for the contracting of researchers. Figure 6 shows the percentage distribution of UAIC funding by source type (a) and by research thematic area (b). Mobility activities represent approximately 50% of the income, while R&D projects represent only approximately 25%, noting however the remarks made above. Income by external contracts maintained a level of 10% of the total amount but decreased in absolute value, which is probably related to the economic situation. From a point of view of thematic area distribution, the two areas of Earth, Sea and Environment and Basic Sciences and Engineering contribute with approximately one third of the total each, with the remaining shared among the other areas. (a)
7,4% 0,3%
0,2%
Inovation
Institucional
Community support & extension
7,6% R&D units
49,7% Mobility
24,3% R&D projects
10,5% Contracting
(b)
2,8% 23,8%
Art, Literature and History
Transversal
6,1% Economics, Managment and Tourism
30,2% Basic Sciences and Engineering
2,6%
Table 2: balance and accounts of UAIC for 2010 and 2011.
Social Sciences, Education and Teaching
4,1%
This amount is on the order of the difference between the amounts on R&D projects of 2010 and 2011. This difference is in fact not due to a decrease of activty in this area but to a delayed transfer of funds of the Foundation for Science
Health Sciences and Technology
30,3% Earth Sciences, Sea and Environment
Figure 6: distribution of the UAIC income of 2011 by activity type (a) and thematic area (b).
Human resources The characterization of the UAlg human resources involved in R&D is drawn from the report on human potential for R&D of 2010 [1]. Figure 7 shows the UAlg’s research staff distribution by thematic area. Another important source of information is the evolution of the number of R&D fellowships along the last four years shown in figure 8. One can note a significant oscillation in 2010, highly correlated with the lifecycle of research projects, mainly those funded by the Foundation for Science and Technology.
13%
13%
Economics, Managment and Tourism
Art, Literature and History
20%
31%
Social Sciences, Education and Teaching
Basic Sciences and Engineering
5% Health Sciences and Technology
18% Earth Sciences, Sea and Environment
Figure 7: thematic area distribution of the 705 R&D staff that have answered to the inquiry on human potential resources 2010.
R&D fellowships
191 101
2008
124
2009
107
2010
2011
Figure 8: evolution of the number of R&D fellowships between 2008 and 2011.
Another important source of information is the evolution of the number of R&D fellowships along the last four years (...) One can note a significant oscillation in 2010, highly correlated with the lifecycle of research projects, mainly those funded by the Foundation for Science and Technology.
R&D PERFORMANCE There are a variety of indicators for characterizing R&D performance, where here the following were selected: ISI Web of Knowledge (ISI-WoK) publications, R&D internationalization, innovation and techonology transfer (contracting and patents) and the output of postgraduate studies (Bologna 3rd cycle).
Scientific publications Figure 9 shows the number of scientific publications of UAlg drawn from ISI-WoK database, which is the reference database for science, technology and social sciences in Portugal. According to this indictor, one can note the decrease of UAlg scientific production between 2008 and 2010 with, however a slight increase in 2011. Also, note that at national level (gray curve and right scale) the strong increase of the last decades has reached its overall maximum in 2009 and shows a slight decrease between 2010 and 2011.
R&D and teaching internationalization The degree of internationalization has become one of the most important indicators of the capacity for increasing quality, for growth and attraction of quality students and researchers. Figure 10(a) shows the strong degree of internationalization of the R&D projects of University of Algarve with more thatn 50% of projects with international partners, from a total of 171 ongoing in 2011. Most of the international partners are from European countries, with particular relevance for those from Spain, France and Italy. The table of figure 10(b) shows the number of students admitted in mobility programs, for a total of 823, i.e., approximately 10% of the total UAlg students.
(a) Other Countries Denmark Norway The Netherlands Ireland Germany United Kingdom Greece Italy
4
450
4.5
400
4
350
3.5
300
3
250
2.5
200
0
150
1.5
100
1
50
0.5
0
0 1994
1996
1998
2000
2002
2004
2006
2008
France Spain Portugal
National Publications
UAlg Publications
x10
7% 0,8% 1,3% 1,9% 2,4% 3,5% 4% 4,6% 5,9% 9,4%
2010
Figure 9: UAlg’s scientific productivity ISIWoK (bars, left y-axis) and Portugal national productivity (yellow line, right y-axis) between 1994 and 2011.
15% 44,2%
(b) Programme Erasmus Mundus (A1) Erasmus Mundus (A2) Exchange Atlantis Normal Total
43 48 304 2 428 823
Figure 10: projects with international participants in 2011 by country (a) and number of foreign students admitted in mobility programs in scholar year 2011-12(b).
The degree of internationalization has become one of the most important indicators of the capacity for increasing quality, for growth and attraction of quality students and researchers.
Figure 11 shows the distribution of UAlg project partners by institution type, for the same set of 171 ongoing projects in 2011.
10%
R&D Units
33%
Public Institutions
6%
Companies
10%
Private Institutions
41%
Higher Education Institutions
Figure 11: institution type of the UAlg R&D project partners during 2011.
Postgraduate studies The third cyle of high school education leading to the PhD degree have followed the Bologna reform, and all the degrees awarded by the University of Algarve have been duly adapted by the end of 2010. In parallel to this process, the Council for Doctoral Education of the European University Association (EUACDE) has organized a number Enrolled 2011 Number of students Arts, Literature and History 48 Basic Sciences and Engineering 34 118 Earth Sciences, Sea and Environment 16 Health Sciences and Technology Social Sciences, Education and Teaching 65 95 Economics, Managment and Tourism Total 376
Degrees 2010 2011 2 1 1 2 12 9 5 0 11 5 3 3 31 23
Table 3: number of students enrolled in the third cycle by thematic area and concluded degrees in 2010 and 2011.
of initiatives and workshops promoting a change of paradigm of the doctoral formation attempting to follow the societal changes, namely those associated with the contribution of doctoral formation to the labour market and their real contribution to the global and competitive economy. The studies that have been carried out at European level showed that during the last decades the impact of doctoral education in the economy lagged far behind expectations. From this debates and initiatives a number of recommendations were made that are summarized in the Salzburg Declaration [2]. The University of Algarve started in 2011 a process of convergence with the recommendations of the EUA-CDE, with the objective of an increased competitiveness of the doctoral offer of the University in two main aspects: to promote quality of advanced education, by means of generalizing the format of doctoral program, in the framework of a doctoral school, i.e., a flexible consortium of institutions, including national and international research centres, laboratories and private companies, ensuring the best possible quality on each scientific domain, leading to an increase of the offer of joint and multiple degree, and enhancing the development of the professional curriculum of the doctoral candidate, which should become the center and the focus of the teaching process, promoting an increasing adaptation to the professional career. Table 3 shows the number of students enrolled in doctoral studies by thematic area and those having obtained their degree in 2010 and 2011. One can notice a still relatively high number of students compared with the number of concluded degrees per year. This may be due to a variety of factors among which those related to the lack of job opportunities in the labor market at the moment, generating some inertia for the students go into the market.
REFERENCES [1] “Potencial Humano para a Investigação 2010", UAIC, Universidade do Algarve, Abril 2011. [2] www.eua.be/Libraries/Publications_homepage_list/Salzburg_II_Recommendations.sflb.ashx
Unidade de Apoio à Investigação Científica e Formação Pós-Graduada Universidade do Algarve Tel. 289 800100 e-mail: uaic@ualg.pt www.ualg.pt