A laboratory of SalivaTec, a platform of CIIS (Centro de Investigação Interdisciplinar em Saúde), was certified by ERS and INSA to perform the molecular diagnosis of COVID-19, becoming part of the Portuguese Network of Laboratories for the Diagnosis of COVID-19.

The certification of the laboratory follows the development of the "CoVTec in Saliva" project - a project funded by the RESEARCH 4 COVID-19 programme of the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia 2020 - whose main objective was to establish new protocols for the diagnosis of COVID-19, using saliva as a non-invasive diagnostic tool.

The infrastructure, now enabled, is based at the Faculdade de Medicina Dentária of Universidade Católica Portuguesa and constitutes a R&TD Platform to support the SNS (National Health System), in Viseu, for a faster response and a more efficient management of this pandemic.

Católica's certified laboratory is, in partnership with the municipality of Viseu, providing support to community screening in Viseu, namely to athletes on their return to sports activities. The use of saliva as a non-invasive approach was welcomed as an added value by all sports leaders.

Related news:

• Innovative methodology of SalivaTec used in the COVID-19 testing in the Municipality of Viseu

Isaura Martins, a Junior Group Leader at  Católica Medical School, Universidade Católica Portuguesa, was recognized with a prestigious research award by Wings for Life Foundation, a globally recognized non-profit committed to funding research aimed at finding a cure for spinal cord injuries. 

This prize highlights Isaura Martins’ groundbreaking research on the role of a subset of pericytes in spinal cord injury repair and regeneration.

“I am deeply honored to receive the Wings for Life Award” said the researcher, adding: “Spinal cord injury remains a devastating condition with limited therapeutic options and no cure. I believe that by shifting our focus into the vasculature, particularly on this subset of pericytes, we might unlock new ways to promote a better microenvironment within the spinal cord tissue, bringing us closer to fully understand this disorder and to discover new viable treatments.”

Isaura Martins started this work at the Gulbenkian Institute for Molecular Medicine, where the researcher did her postdoctoral research in the laboratory of Leonor Saúde.

Now, at Centro de Investigação Interdisciplinar em Saúde, Isaura Martins is spearheading this innovative study to investigate how pericytes - a specialized type of cells that wrap the blood vessels and are important for their stability - can contribute to tissue repair and functional recovery after spinal cord injury.

Recently she identified a protein that is expressed in pericytes only after injury. Her research aims now to uncover how the pericytes that express this protein, MYLIP, interact with the spinal cord's microenvironment, composed by all the cells and molecules that are important for its function and structure.

Understanding how these pericytes can affect key processes in spinal cord injury, such as inflammation, can be a promising strategy to improve natural repair mechanisms. 

The award underscores Wings for Life's mission to support pioneering research with the potential to transform the lives of millions affected by spinal cord injuries worldwide and contributed to establishing Isaura Martins’ new research group at Católica Medical School, where she intends to further explore how vascular and perivascular cells contribute for spinal cord repair after injury. 

Find out more about the Católica research group

Find out more about the Wings for Life Foundation

Researchers from the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Health of the Instituto de Ciências da Saúde (CIIS-ICS), Professor Ana Mineiro, Professor Alexandre Castro Caldas and Master Mara Moita, published an original research article on language evolution in the scientific journal Frontiers in Psychology.

The article is entitled “Disentangling Pantomime From Early Sign in a New Sign Language: Window Into Language Evolution Research”.

Check the article here.

The identification of supporters with a sports club has a powerful effect on the decision to buy the products of the brands sponsoring the club. A new study shows that even if we do not like a drink sponsored by our club, we are more likely to buy it, and for more money. 

The study with the title "Sports ingroup love does not make me like a sponsor's beverage but gets me buying it", developed by an interdisciplinary team, was published today in PLOS One. This study, funded by the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Health (CIIS), was designed by Ana Maria Abreu, a researcher in the area of Experimental Psychology from the Universidade Católica Portuguesa, together with Rui Biscaia from the area of Sports Management (University of Bath). But this project only came to life when computer engineers Sara Franco and Sandra Gama (Instituto Superior Técnico) joined the team, allowing the assessment of brain activity associated with emotions during a tasting of a drink (presented as a sponsor of the team with which the participants identified or as a sponsor of the rival team). "It was Sara Franco, a brilliant master's student from IST, who raised the quality of this work by introducing the computer-brain interface that allowed the reading of positive and negative emotions during the tasting of the drink" tells Ana Maria Abreu. 

The research team studied the impact of identification with a sports club on the sensory experience of the taste of a drink sponsoring each participant's (football) team or rival team. While many studies show that identification with a team leads to the decision to consume the sponsoring products, little is known about the influence of identification with a sports team on the consumption experience itself.

"We thought that a big Benfica or Sporting fan would have a more pleasurable experience trying the drink that sponsored their team. We thought that this phenomenon would follow sensory mechanisms. In other words, the taste experience itself would be more positive and this experience would lead to the decision to consume." says Ana Maria Abreu.

However, the team was surprised when they realised that the emotions of participants who tried the drink sponsoring their team, were not very different from the emotions of participants who drank the drink sponsoring the rival team. "It seemed that no one had much appreciation for the drink. However, everyone expressed that the drink was pleasant, perhaps out of sympathy or cordiality" says Ana Maria Abreu, underlining the inconsistency between the psychophysiological data and the actual responses of the study participants.

Despite the consistent lack of appreciation for the taste of the drink, and the consistent approval of the drink by all participants, only those who identified with the team sponsored by the drink were willing to pay more for the drink.

"Our study emphasizes the overwhelming influence of the brand in consumption decisions, weighing much more than the quality of the drink itself" says the researcher from the Universidade Católica Portuguesa.

Check the study here.

"Interdisciplinary Health Care" is the theme of the National Meeting of the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Health (CIIS), which takes place at the Sintra campus of Universidade Católica, from March 31st to April 1st.  

The event is organized by the CIIS platform CatólicaMed and is intended exclusively for researchers and members of the platforms that compose the research centre, CatólicaMed, Translational Neuroscience, Nursing Research, Salivatec and Precision Dental Medicine. 

The meeting will focus on 3 themes: Translational Care, Clinical Care and Community Care. During two days, CIIS experts will share and discuss their research work. 

The papers, talks and posters, presented during the meeting, will be published in an international journal indexed to Scopus and with impact factor. Additionally, the best poster of each session will be awarded in the closing session. 

For more information contact researchlab.fm@ucp.pt or visit the website. 
 

Check the full programme here.

"The future of health will not only be defined by the innovations we set out to create; it will also be shaped by how we respond - and anticipate - the challenges and consequences of each major advance". It was with these words that the President of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Isabel Capeloa Gil, inaugurated the National Meeting of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Health (CIIS), which was held from 31 March to 1 April at the Católica Medical School.

At this national meeting, which brought together more than a hundred researchers from all CIIS platforms and disciplines, the President noted that "the University has established a series of very demanding quantitative objectives for the production and funding of research", stressing the importance of CIIS "to interim and strengthen innovation, while boosting not only incremental innovation, but also disruptive innovation."

Meanwhile, Paulo Bettencourt, deputy director of CIIS, highlighted the importance of interdisciplinarity, the theme of the meeting, to explain the chosen methodology: "instead of grouping researchers by platform or disciplines, it was decided to create three inclusive working sessions: Translation Care; Clinical Care and Community Care."

An opportunity, according to the chair of the meeting, to "discover the latest scientific achievements of other colleagues, initiate new collaborations and plan major projects for the future, keeping in mind the main goal of improving healthcare with an interdisciplinary vision, to improve the quality of life as much as possible, with humanity and spirituality at the centre of all scientific missions."

"We are walking on the shoulders of a giant and we are fortunate to be in an institution that looks beyond the horizon and always aspires for more," António Medina de Almeida also mentioned in the opening session of the meeting.

The Dean of the Católica Medical School added that the "School is a collaborative project, with the aim of promoting quality and integration of teaching, research and medical care, through close collaboration and optimisation of the resources of its members".

Under the topic "Challenges and Opportunities For Universities in the 21st Century, -Strategy for Health Research", Tomáš Zima, professor at Charles University in Prague, spoke.

The guest speaker mentioned that "universities have to adapt and be competitive and can contribute to solutions, in a dynamic, unstable and unpredictable Era."

"Despite changes, fundamental traditional principles need to be preserved and followed, such as: Freedom of research and educational activity, as well as integrity, autonomy and independence," said Tomáš Zima.

"Universities have an impact on the well-being of society and are the driving force for change towards a better economic, social and environmental situation," he concluded.

The papers, talks and posters presented during this meeting will be published in an international journal, indexed to Scopus.

A team of doctors and researchers from CIIS (Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Health) and the Faculty of Dentistry of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa won the 4th edition of the Rui Osório de Castro/Millennium BCP Award.

The project, entitled "Understanding to Prevent Oral Mucositis in Children with Oncological Disease", aims to study the oral health of children undergoing antineoplastic treatment and contribute to the prevention of Oral Mucositis, a very frequent and debilitating side effect of these therapies. The project is led by Patrícia Nunes Correia and has the collaboration of Raquel Silva and Carla Gonçalves, from the Portuguese Catholic University, Filipa Leite from IPO-Porto and Luísa Azevedo from IPATIMUP/i3S.

The Rui Osório de Castro Foundation's main objective is to support and protect children with cancer and their families by concentrating its activity in two major areas: INFORMING, clarifying parents and children on issues related to childhood cancer and PROMOTING RESEARCH, thus contributing to the advancement of medicine in this area.

The prize will be awarded at the 6th Paediatric Oncology Seminar, organised by the Rui Osório de Castro Foundation, which will take place on February 8 at the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.

A research team from Universidade Católica Portuguesa in Porto received an exoskeleton (i.e. robotic legs) for rehabilitation studies in people with neurological diseases. Miguel Pais-Vieira, researcher at Centro de Investigação Interdisciplinar em Saúde (CIIS), states that "the use of exoskeletons for locomotion is in its early stages, and in Portugal there is a very small number of such devices".

The novelty of the study, which involves members of Centro de Investigação Interdisciplinar em Saúde (Miguel Pais-Vieira, Carla Pais-Vieira and Mehrab Khazraei; CIIS) and Centro de Investigação de Ciência e Tecnologia das Artes (André Perrotta, CITAR), is not only the use of an exoskeleton. In this case, the importance of the study lies in the fact that the exoskeleton will be directly controlled by the brain activity of the user. In other words, the user will only have to think about walking and the brain commands recorded through EEG (electroencephalography) will be decoded in real time serving as an instruction for the exoskeleton to start walking. In previous studies it was demonstrated that this combination of techniques (which in this case will still be complemented with virtual reality and tactile and thermal feedback) can lead to significant improvements in cases of spinal cord injury.

The project is innovative because it will combine advances in robotics, art technology, neuroscience, psychology, protein analysis and rehabilitation into a single rehabilitation protocol. Thus, the realization of this project will allow two important steps to be taken:

1. to replicate recent technological advances, bringing this new technology to the country;
2. determine whether the introduction of new variables can lead to an improvement in the rehabilitation protocol.

The consortium, which has joined efforts to achieve this goal, is composed of members from Universidade Católica Portuguesa (CIIS/ICS, Escola das Artes, FMD), Universidade do Minho (ICVS, Centro Algoritmi), Guimarães Hospital, Braga Hospital, Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (Brazil) and Santos Dumont Institute (Brazil). Support for this project comes from FCT, Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Lisboa, Fundação Bial, Norte 2020, as well as the private company ExoAtlet.

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The Universidade Católica Portuguesa won 2nd prize for best poster in the "Other Areas" category at the IPO-Porto Summit, which took place from May 9 to 11, 2024, at the premises of the Instituto Português de Oncologia do Porto, as part of the celebrations for its 50th anniversary.

Under the motto "Research and Innovation in Improving Healthcare in Oncology", the IPO-Porto Summit highlighted the excellence of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa's research and its significant contribution to improving healthcare in oncology.

The winning study, entitled "Risk factors for cancer treatment-related oral mucositis in children", was written by Tatiana Henrique, a student on the Integrated Master's Degree in Dental Medicine, and by Anna Mello-Moura and Raquel Silva, professors at the Faculty of Dental Medicine and researchers at the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Health at the Universidade Católica Portuguesa. Professor Patrícia Correia, currently at Universidade Fernando Pessoa, also collaborated on the project.

Sílvia Caldeira and researchers Ana Afonso, Helga Martins, Janaina Fabri, Joana Romeiro and Sara Sitefane from the Spirit Health group of the Nursing Research Platform of the Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Health of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa took part in the 9th European Conference on Religion, Spirituality and Health.

Seven papers and five posters were presented at the event, which took place in Salzburg (Austria) on May 16, 17 and 18.

Sílvia Caldeira was keynote speaker at a conference that brought together more than 100 participants in person and online.

Ana Mineiro and Mara Moita, researchers of the Nice Lab of the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research in Health of the Institute of Health Sciences of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa, are invited as Keynote Speaker to the Scientific Meeting of the Center of Language Evolution Research of the Nicolaus Copernicus University, in Poland, which will take place in April.

André Correia (Chairman of the Iberian section of the ITI) and Patrícia Fonseca, professors at the Faculty of Dental Medicine (FMD) of the Viseu Regional Centre of the Universidade Católica Portuguesa, took part in the ITI World Symposium, from 9 to 11 May in Singapore, with the presentation of two works carried out within the scope of the Postgraduate Course in Digital Prosthetic Oral Rehabilitation and the Centre for Interdisciplinary Health Research (CIIS).  

Dedicated to computer-guided implant surgeries carried out by teams of students and teachers at the University Dental Clinic, these papers highlight the advantages of Precision Dentistry and reinforce Portugal's position at the forefront of health research and innovation. Tiago Marques, a professor at the FMD, and Catarina Fonseca and Margarida Quezada, researchers at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Health Research (CIIS), were part of the team. 

The project "CoVTec em Saliva - Diagnóstico da COVID-19 em Saliva" coordinated by Católica (CIIS-SalivaTec) in partnership with Centro Hospitalar Tondela Viseu and Instituto Politécnico de Viseu, was funded by FCT in the amount of 30,000 euros following the application for special support under the RESEARCH 4 COVID-19 program.

With CoVTec the protocols for the diagnosis of COVID-19 in saliva and evaluation of the immune response to SARS-CoV2 will be established.

The partnerships established and the infrastructures involved allow the establishment in Viseu of an R&DT Platform to support the NHS, for a faster and more efficient response to this and future pandemics.

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