Unit for Innovation and Research in Engineering

A wide range of activities have been developed by the members of the UnIRE unit:

Internationalisation:

As an indicator of the internationalisation of the research conducted by the members, they belong to more than 15 prominent technical/scientific networks (APAET, IEOM, IFAC, IFIP, PhoBioS, SOCOLNET, Bioelectrics Consortium, etc.).

Another indicator of research internationalisation is the collaboration network of the members of the research team, which comprise researchers from eminent European and non-European institutions. Some of these researchers, which belong to institutions from Germany, United Kingdom, Sweden, Singapore, among other countries, are collaborator members of UnIRE.

The members' funding also illustrates the research's international range. Besides the national funding (FCT, ANI, etc.), the research has been supported by international entities, such as European Union’s Horizon 2020 programme, International Federation of Automatic Control, CERN, European Union - Next Generation EU and Erasmus +, among others.

Advanced education:

The members are involved in PhD, MSc, BSc programmes, as coordinators and collaborators.

The members have supervised 13 PhD works (concluded and ongoing) and about 200 MSc works (concluded and ongoing) in all the areas of the R&D unit. 

Activities of scientific initiation of younger students:

The scientific initiation of younger students has been a real focus of the researchers. Tenths of summer school programmes for high-school students, such as Ciência Viva, OCJF or Polytechnic University of Setúbal’s Summer School, have been organised.

Organisation of scientific events:

The involvement of the researchers as chair or organizing committee members of more than 15 conferences (for example, Bioelectrics 2023; PRO-VE 2022; ISC'2019) and as programme/scientific members of more than 160 conferences illustrates their significant roles in scientific events.

Development of patents and prototypes:

Four patents (2 granted; 2 under analysis) have been developed by the members.

Knowledge and technology transfer/Activities relevant to society:

The research activities conducted by the members have had an important impact on the society, as indicated below: 

1) Advanced pilot. The ISEL EcoCampus - Living Lab is an international program recognized by UNESCO that envisages promoting environmental education in Higher Education Institutions. 

2) Technology transfer. Development of new dental ceramic with improved mechanical properties. Work on dental wear targeted the effect of surface veneers that usually coat the commercial materials used in dental crowns. The application of coating was found to result in an increase of the overall wear of restoration/tooth couples tested. Consequently, ZIRCLAB company changed its coating procedures and advises their dentist clients to use unveneered molar tooth crowns on occlusal surfaces.

3) Technology transfer. Method for manufacturing ceramic scaffolds using 3D printed moulds. Development and validation, in collaboration with Bioceramed, of a method for manufacturing ceramic scaffolds using 3D printed moulds.  

4) Technology transfer. Development of recycled cement in collaboration with SECIL. The construction and demolition waste is separated into the old cement fraction and the aggregates and other debris. The old cement is thermally activated to produce recycled low-carbon cement. After rehydration, this cement and the recovered aggregates are used to manufacture an eco-efficient recycled concrete.

Dissemination:

The team has published more than 150 papers in international journals, about 125 papers in conference proceedings, about 15 book chapters, 10 edited books and 2 published books.  

Research projects:

The members have been involved in a total of 52 projects. From these projects, more than 20 were led by members of this unit. These projects, which encompass all scientific areas of the unit, correspond to total funding greater than 4,000,000 €.