This 2-day conference organised by the Champalimaud Foundation, in partnership with Faculdade de Motricidade Humana, will provide an overview of the scientific landscape in the area of physical activity and cancer, from prevention to rehabilitation and survivorship.

These are exciting times for research in this space as physical activity becomes more widely recognised as a powerful partner in the prevention and treatment of cancer.

Joining institutions such as the Max Planck Society, Germany (#1), the Allen Institute, USA (#6), and the Pasteur Institute, France (#13), the CF's ranking places it among the world’s top contributors to neuroscience, and as the only Portuguese institution to make the list. The ranking is based on its contribution to published research, which is measured by both the number of articles (“Count”) and the portion of authorship (“Share”).

The fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, is a widely used model in neuroscience due to its relatively small brain, which is easier to study than those of larger animals. Despite its size, the Drosophila brain is capable of forming memories, learning, and engaging in sophisticated social behaviours. Remarkably, fruit flies perform calculations as complex as vertebrates, but with a brain that has far fewer neurons. They share about 60% of their genes with humans, and 75% of human genetic diseases have parallels in flies.

On the 3rd of October, a full day pre-meeting summit was held on the KPro, the revolutionising keratoprosthesis developed by Claes Dohlman, laureate of the 2022 António Champalimaud Vision Award, receiving it shortly after his 100th birthday. The summit celebrated Dohlman’s legacy with recent advances partly funded by the award and innovative work from around the globe. 
 

Natural ageing is one of the main risk factors for cancer. As we become older, the probability of developing cancer increases. This happens, on the one hand, because the probability of acquiring cancer-causing mutations grows as we live longer; and on the other, because our DNA repair mechanisms decline with age.

This congress reaffirmed the collaboration between the two countries in the research and treatment of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, a condition with a higher incidence in aging societies like those of Spain and Portugal, and with a profound economic and social impact.

The ERC Starting Grant is one of Europe’s most prestigious and competitive research awards, designed to support promising early-career researchers who have the potential to become leaders in their fields. Ianuş will receive €2M over the next five years to develop her research project at King’s College London, where she recently joined as a Lecturer in Healthcare Engineering.

Here are some recurrent unproven claims:

How do we learn to make sense of our environment? Over time, our brain builds a hierarchy of knowledge, with higher-order concepts linked to the lower-order features that comprise them. For instance, we learn that cabinets contain drawers and that Dalmatian dogs have black-and-white patches, and not vice versa. This interconnected framework shapes our expectations and perception of the world, allowing us to identify what we see based on context and experience.