Research news

List of news published in the Press Room on research and innovation

  • The UPC celebrates 20 years of entrepreneurial spirit

    The UPC is celebrating the 20th anniversary of the creation of the Innova Programme, a pioneering initiative in Catalonia and Spain focused on promoting the culture of innovation and entrepreneurship in the university community and fostering the creation of knowledge- and technology-based companies. As a result of this initiative, more than 300 companies have created 4,500 jobs, more than 500 patents have been applied for, and more than 200 technologies have been licensed as a result of research.

  • The ANYWHERE project will showcase their major achievements in Brussels

    The Centre of Applied Research in Hydrometeorology (CRAHI) of the UPC is coordinating the ANYWHERE project, aimed at establishing a pan-European multi-hazard platform for faster analysis and anticipation of weather-induced risks prior to event occurrence. It will also improve response management in emergency situations and help exposed populations avert loss of life, damage to infrastructure and economic losses related to these events. The project will showcase their major achievements in the Security Research Event 2018 to be held in Brussels this week.

  • A nanosatellite developed at the NanoSat Lab of the UPC has been placed in orbit with six experiments on board

    The launch, funded by the Institute of Space Studies of Catalonia (IEEC), took place at 5:28 a.m. from the Sriharikota space base (India)

  • NASA’s InSight probe with UPC technology on board lands successfully on Mars

    On 26 November, NASA’s InSight probe landed successfully on Mars with UPC technology on board. Researchers from the UPC’s Micro and Nanotechnologies Research Group participated in the design of the wind sensor that travelled on the probe, which will be the first to record seismic vibrations and measure the flow of heat emitted by the planet’s surface. This information will help determine the planet’s internal composition and how it was formed.

  • The UPC, a major player in the development of Industry 4.0

    Of students now attending primary school, 63% will end up working in a job that does not yet exist. This disturbing fact is closely related to what is known as the fourth industrial revolution, Industry 4.0, which is transforming industry through a combination of production methods and advanced information technologies to make manufacturing adaptive and flexible. The main challenge is to make all the information available in real time by integrating the entities that make up the value chain.

  • European artificial intelligence leaders meet at the UPC in Barcelona to promote the use of this technology in the EU

    This meeting marks the starting point of the AI4EU project, which receives €20 million euros in funding from the European Commission and has 79 partners from 21 countries, among them 60 leading research centres. The objective is to provide users with artificial intelligence resources that favour scientific research and technological innovation. The AI4EU Ethics Observatory will also be created to guarantee a human-centred AI.

  • The UPC participates in a European trial of a treatment to reduce mortality of cardiogenic shock

    The EURO SHOCK trial includes the main cardiovascular hospitals in nine European countries. The UPC is participating in the project with CardioSense, a device that provides an early cardiovascular diagnosis in less than 60 seconds. Over 400 patients will participate in the trial, which will begin on 1 February and continue for 34 months.

  • The UPC continues promoting technology-based companies by backing six new spin-offs

    In the last few months, the UPC has launched and partnered with six new spin-offs, namely: Elem Biotech, Mitiga Solutions, NearbyComputing (these three with the Barcelona Supercomputing Center - Centro Nacional de Supercomputación as a shareholder), e-Health Technical Solutions, Icaria Medical and ARD.

  • The motility of a unicellular aquatic organism could inspire new robotic crawlers

    A team of researchers led by professor and researcher Marino Arroyo, from the UPC and the IBEC, discovered Euglena cells’ ability to crawl remarkably fast in narrow spaces. These unicellular organisms live in water and perform harmoniously coordinated, large-amplitude cell body deformations, in a behaviour known as metaboly. The results of the research, published in Nature Physics, could inspire new applications in the field of medical robotics.

  • The UPC once again at the Mobile World Congress

    Several biotechnology and 5G projects backed by the UPC, as well as a number of spin-offs from the University, were presented at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) and the 4 Years From Now (4YFN) event, which took place in Barcelona between 25 and 28 February.

  • The UPC in Terrassa is leading the creation of new technologies for industrial wastewater treatment and reuse

    INTEXTER and the MCIA research group, both of which belong to the UPC and are located on the Terrassa Campus, launched the ELDE project with the aim of creating new technologies for wastewater treatment and reuse in the paper, chemical and leather tanning industries. INTEXTER also participates in the REGIREU project to evaluate the combination of two technologies for the reuse of effluents in new dyeing processes on a pilot scale. Two technology centres and six SMEs are also involved in these projects, which have a budget of over 4 million euros.

  • Researchers from BASF, the ALBA Synchrotron and the UPC propose a methodology to increase the strength of concrete

    Researchers from the UPC, the ALBA Synchrotron and the chemical company BASF have established how clays and superplasticisers interact in cement pastes using synchrotron light. These results pave the way for improving the design of new superplasticisers with enhanced tolerance to the clays contained in the sand used for concrete production.

  • Some piezoelectric materials may be ‘fakes’

    A team of researchers has discovered that the most widespread technique for characterising piezoelectric properties—the ability of some materials to generate electricity when subjected to mechanical stress—can yield ‘false positives’ due to flexoelectricity. The study, which is the result of the collaboration between the Numerical Methods Laboratory (LaCàN) at the UPC and the Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (ICN2), will facilitate research of the application of these materials in pressure sensors and electric nanogenerators.

  • A study led by the UPC and the IEEC has determined the mass and radius of one of the oldest stars in our galaxy for the first time

    A study led by the researcher Alberto Rebassa-Mansergas, from the UPC and the IEEC, has determined the mass and radius of one of the oldest stars in our galaxy for the first time and validated the theoretical mass-radius relations for such stars. The results of this study are published in the journal Nature Astronomy.

  • A thesis on Paulista Avenue in the Brazilian city of São Paulo was awarded the Manuel de Solà-Morales European Prize in the field of urbanism

    The architect Renata Priore Lima, a professor at the Architecture and Urbanism College of São Paulo (Brazil), received the Manuel de Solà-Morales European Prize in urbanism in its second edition for her doctoral thesis “Plugin: interfaces urbanas en los nuevos centros lineales: el caso de la Avenida Paulista”, defended at the UPC. Three additional awards were also given to finalist projects at the award ceremony, which took place on 19 March at the UPC’s Barcelona School of Architecture (ETSAB).

  • A new study shows that chimpanzee gestural communication and human language follow the same linguistic patterns

    The researcher Ramon Ferrer, from the Relational Algorithmics, Complexity and Learnability Laboratory (LARCA) at the UPC, participated with foreign researchers in a study on linguistic laws in chimpanzees’ gestural communication. The study revealed that data compression underpins animal gestural communication.

  • Researchers have identified a plastic crystal that could be used as an eco-friendly coolant in refrigerators and air conditioners

    In a joint research project, researchers from the UPC’s Department of Physics, the University of Cambridge and the University of Barcelona have identified an eco-friendly solid that could replace hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) and hydrocarbons (HCs), which are highly toxic and flammable. These two types of gases are currently used in the vast majority of refrigerators, air conditioners and cooling systems. The research was recently published in Nature Communications.

  • The analysis of a meteorite reveals secrets about the birth of the solar system

    The study has been carried out by an international team of cosmochemists and astrophysicists, including researcher Jordi José, from the Institute of Space Studies of Catalonia (IEEC) and the Department of Physics of the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya - BarcelonaTech (UPC). Encapsulated in a meteorite collected in Antarctica, the tiny grain – only a few microns in size – has shed new light on the terminal phases of the star’s life and how stars sow the Universe with the building blocks for new stars, planets and life.

  • The brain as an inspiration for future processors

    Researching the design of new intelligent computing systems inspired by the human brain is the goal of the “CoCoUnit: An Energy-Efficient Processing Unit for Cognitive Computing” project, led by Antonio González, a researcher from the Department of Computer Architecture at the UPC. He has received an Advanced Grant, the highest award granted by the European Research Council to investigators pursuing groundbreaking high-risk projects.

  • Maria Pau Ginebra, Eduard Alarcón, Marcel Guardia and Maria Teresa Martínez-Seara receive the 2018 ICREA Acadèmia distinctions

    UPC researchers Maria Pau Ginebra, Eduard Alarcón, Marcel Guardia and Maria Teresa Martínez-Seara are four of the forty-five researchers who received the 2018 ICREA Acadèmia distinctions on 30 April at the Palau de la Generalitat. The event was chaired by the minister for Business and Knowledge, Àngels Chacón, and attended by the minister for Universities and Research, Francesc Xavier Grau, and ICREA director and UPC professor Antonio Huerta.

  • STAT-ON, a new device that helps monitor the symptoms of patients with Parkinson’s

    Developed of the UPC, the Sense4Care spin-off and the Centro Médico Teknon – Quirónsalud

  • A UPC researcher in Terrassa creates the first tomography map for diagnosing glaucoma

    Pablo Amil, a researcher from the research group in Nonlinear Dynamics, Nonlinear Optics and Lasers (DONLL) at the ESEIAAT, has created an objective model that classifies the degrees of the iridocorneal angle, a key element for assessing the severity of glaucoma. With this model, ophthalmologists will have a tool to help patients make a decision when considering surgery. The method has been developed in the framework of the European project Be-Optical and published this year in the journal Scientific Reports, from the publishers of Nature.

  • The BSC-CNS will be home to one of the largest European supercomputers: MareNostrum 5

    The Barcelona Supercomputing Center–Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS) will host one of the pre-exascale supercomputers in the high-performance computer network promoted by the European Commission, namely MareNostrum 5. It will be a heterogeneous supercomputer adapted to the new requirements of supercomputer users that will emphasise artificial intelligence and will have a peak performance of 200 petaflops

  • Testing a drone to save lives in the Mediterranean

    Three students from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech (UPC) are participating, together with the Hemav Foundation, in the FREEDA project, in which they are developing an offshore reconnaissance drone to search for people and boats. The aim is to improve Proactiva Open Arms rescue missions. The first test to check the operation of the drone on the NGO’s ship was recently carried out offshore from Borriana (Castellón).

  • Microchips manufactured at the UPC will measure the wind on Mars

    The UPC’s Micro and Nanotechnologies Research Group has participated in the design, manufacture and calibration of the wind sensor of the MEDA instrument, which will travel to Mars on board NASA’s Mars 2020 mission to measure wind direction and speed, relative humidity, pressure and properties of suspended dust on the Red Planet. It will be the third time that UPC technology travels to Mars. On this occasion, it is 60 silicon dice that make up the heart of the sensor and that were recently delivered to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

  • A new H2020 project led by the UPC aims to improve the production of hydroelectric power

    Xavier Escaler, a researcher at the UPC’s Centre for Industrial Diagnostics and Fluid Dynamics, is leading the European project AFC4Hydro, which aims to design and validate an active flow control (AFC) system for hydraulic turbines to monitor the structural health of turbines in real time and improve their performance. The idea is to develop technologies that allow the growth of renewables in the European integrated electricity generation system.

  • The UPC is still the top Spanish university in obtaining funds from the H2020 programme

    The Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC) continues to be the first Spanish university in raising funds from the European framework programme for research and innovation Horizon 2020 (H2020), according to the provisional results of the latest reports by the Centre for the Development of Industrial Technology (CDTI) for the period 2014–2018.

  • The UPC selected by the European Commission to build the new European university UNITE!

    The University Network for Innovation, Technology and Engineering - UNITE! is now a fact. The new technological university campus promoted by the European Commission with the participation of the UPC, the Instituto Superior Técnico in Lisbon, the Grenoble Institute of Technology, the Politecnico di Torino, TU Darmstadt, the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and Aalto University is an alliance that aims to create a common space for multidisciplinary training, cooperation in teaching and research, and knowledge transfer between regions.

  • Acoustic map of underwater noise pollution made by the crew of the Fleur de Passion

    The Ocean Mapping Expedition, which has returned to Seville after a four-year world tour aboard the Fleur de Passion sailing boat, mapped acoustic pollution in the ocean. The research project was led by the UPC’s Laboratory of Applied Bioacoustics (LAB).

  • ICFO researchers design new health monitors that are flexible, transparent and based on graphene

    Researchers at the Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO) have developed a new class of flexible, transparent and low-power wearables based on graphene to monitor multiple vital signs, such as heart rate, respiratory rate, blood pulse oxygenation and exposure to UV radiation. The study has been recently published in the Science Advances journal.