Thursday, 3/29/2018
Rui L. Reis was awarded in London with one of the
largest international engineering awards worth 400 thousand euros.
Rui L. Reis,
director of the 3B’s Research Group on Biomaterials, Biomimetics and
Biodegradables (I3Bs) from the School of Engineering of the University of Minho
(EEUM) and vice-rector for University of Minho’s (UMinho) Research and Innovation,
was granted, on the 20th March, in London, the IET Harvey Engineering Research
Award, one of the world’s largest scientific awards in the area of Engineering.
The award is granted each year, and every three years to the Medical
Engineering area, by the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET), which
has 170.000 members from 150 countries. The prize money, worth almost 400
thousand euros, will be used to create innovative and functional 3D cancer
models that can help predict medicine’s efficacy, avoiding the use of various
animal tests and some clinical trials.
“It is a great
privilege to receive this prestigious award and be the first researcher whose
career has been in Portugal, where the language is not English. All previous
winners worked in the UK, USA, Australia or Singapore”, Rui L. Reis stated.
This is an award where no applications are accepted, and only proposals can be
submitted based on the candidate’s curriculum and a five-year scientific
proposal. Only the candidates pre-selected by an international jury can submit
proposals.
The jury has
elected Rui L Reis between several top world figures, praising “his remarkable contributions
and decades of excellence in 3D tissue engineering research for new
regenerative therapies and the development of disease models”. The President of
the selection committee, Sir John O’Reilly, highlighted that “this award
recognises his research track and the impressive record of publications and
quotes. Trials on the efficacy of new anticancer medicines remain one of the
biggest challenges that scientists are facing and the research developed by Rui
L. Reis and his team can accelerate the evaluation of new medicines and the
approval of new treatments”.
The session
took place at the IET headquarters, at Savoy Place, and included a lecture of
Rui L. Reis to the general public entitled “Eng the Cancer”. The distinction
also includes, for the second time in the prize’s history, a ceremony devoted
to the honoree’s university: it will be on the 15th May, at the UMinho, and will
count on the presence of the President of the selection committee, Sir John
O’Reilly, as well as other members of the IET, UMinho’s Rector, Rui Vieira de
Castro, and the Minister of Science, Technology and Higher Education, Manuel
Heitor.
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info: www.3bs.uminho.pt
