News & Events

MEDIA

External File

Report of the Azorean Biodiversity Group (CITA-A)- Year 2012

The year of 2012 was an excellent year for the Azorean Biodiversity Group (ABG- CITA-A).

Publications: A total of 50 publications were published by our integrated members, 31 of which being in International Indexed Journals with Impact Factor (60%). This makes more than two publications by integrated member with a Ph.D., and about 1.5 ISI papers per integrated member with a Ph.D. To those 50 publications we can add 22 more with the affiliation of the ABG (CITA-A, University of Azores) published by our Associate Research Fellows. This high productivity is promoting the internationalization of the ABG (CITA-A, University of Azores)) and increasing the visibility of the group. This year will also be remembered by the creation of the Portuguese Platform for Enhancing Ecological Research & Sustainability (PEERS), a research partnership between ABG (CITA-A; University of Azores; http://www.gba.uac.pt/), the Centre of Environmental Biology (University of Lisbon; http://cba.fc.ul.pt/), and the Centre of Functional Ecology (University of Coimbra; http://cfe.uc.pt/).

Projects: Thirty four projects run in 2012, 19 of which coordinated by integrated members. Eight received international funding, six received national founding by FCT, 13 received regional funding by DRCTC and seven more projects were funded by other Agencies. These 33 projects represent about 1.326.000,00 Euros granted to the group; a part of it was executed in 2012. To these values we may add the Post Doc, Ph.D. and Technical grants obtained in 2012, representing circa 173.000,00 Euros.

Research team: In 2012 the team was composed by 10 senior researchers from the University of Azores, 10 Post Docs (two of which finished their contract in September), 18 Ph.D. students (12 starting in 2012), nine grant students and two technicians. In addition, we could count with the active colaboration of 16 Associate Research Fellows in a number of projects, four of which started in 2012 (Aris Parmakelis, José C. Carvalho, Alain Vanderpoorten and Jairo Patiño); three Associate Research Fellows ended their collaboration with the group (Alberto Jimenez-Valverde, Andrés Baselga and Hanno Schaeffer). We are very grateful to the former members, whose valuable contribution promoted our group on many occasions.

Events: The organization of the Iberian Congress of Entomology in Azores (Terceira) was the main event promoted by the group during 2012. It occurred in September and had more than 130 participants from five countries.

Awards: The “Azorean Biodiversity Group Prizes”, is an initiative of the group to highlight excellence in research and confer larger visibility to outstanding people. Five distinctions were announced during the Iberian Congress of Entomology: i) “The Most Productive Young Researcher 2012” Award – Pedro Cardoso; ii) “BALA –Biodiversity of Arthropods from Laurisilva of Azores 2012” Award – Clara Saraiva Gaspar; iii) “The Azorean Biodiversity Group Engagement 2012” Award – Enésima Mendonça; iv) “The Events 2012” Award – Carla Rego; v) “The Linnean Prize 2012” – Artur R. M. Serrano.