organisation - the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência

PHD PROGRAMME
IN COMPUTATIONAL
BIOLOGY
Jorge Carneiro Head
PhD in Biomedicine, Universidade do Porto, 1997
PI of Quantitative Organism Biology Group
The PhD Programme in Computational Biology (PDBC) is a pilot graduate programme
that aims to create a critical mass of researchers in computational biology,
to act as future leaders in the field. To this end it operates in close association with
its twin initiative, the Collaboratorium in Computational Biology. It is sponsored
by the Portuguese Ministry for Science and Technology, the Calouste Gulbenkian
Foundation, and Siemens Portugal SA.
The PDBC was launched in 2005, has a definitive lifespan and was planned to
educate four generations of 12 students per year. Education is organised as a
four-year programme divided into a year of full-time courses, workshops and
projects, covering the main aspects of computational biology from the biological,
computational, mathematical, chemical and physical points of view, and
three years of research training in a recognised laboratory anywhere in the
world, including Portugal. Non-national citizens were accepted but their research
training was restricted to Portuguese research labs. The choice of laboratory
was left to the student but met the standards set by the Programme
Direction.
SUPPORT STAFF
Cláudio Soares (ITQB, Deputy Director)
Manuela Cordeiro (Administrative Assistant)
FUNDING
Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT), Portugal
Siemens Portugal, SA
Calouste Gulbenkain Foundation, Portugal
PT Foundation, Portugal
Fundação Luso-Americana para o Desenvolvimento (FLAD), Portugal
Fundação para a Computação Científica Nacional (FCCN), Portugal
The PDBC has come of age and all 41 students are carrying out their research
training in labs in Europe and beyond, and eight (Inês de Jesus, José Cruz, Nuno
Mendes, Marcio Mourão, Sara da Silva, Pedro Monteiro, Bruno Correia, and Luis
Figueiredo) have obtained their doctoral degree. Information on the individual
students, and completed theses, can be found on the programme’s website.
IGC ANNUAL REPORT ‘11
GRADUATE TRAINING AND EDUCATION
126