Vision is central to how humans navigate the world, whether recognizing a familiar face in a photo or driving to a family dinner. For Artificial Intelligence (AI), however, even minor visual distortions, such as changes in brightness, contrast, or subtle perturbations, can cause object recognition algorithms to fail. Bridging this performance gap has been a major challenge in machine learning.

As we were wrapping up an earlier conversation with Champalimaud Foundation (CF) Clinical Director Professor António Parreira, I mentioned that there would be a sister article featuring one of his colleagues, Joe Paton, Director of Neuroscience Research at CF. The plan was to ask the same questions, more or less, to explore whether the cultural outlooks of the clinical and research branches aligned after 20 years. I invited António Parreira to open Joe’s interview with a question.

When António Parreira joined the Champalimaud Foundation (CF) more than a decade ago, the place was still more vision than institution. The building stood ready, white limestone gleaming by the river, but inside, there was little activity. “When I arrived, there were just two of us – two doctors,” he recalls. “It was too small then to think of a community.”

The Champalimaud Foundation (CF) has the advantage of housing a research institute and a clinic under the same roof. Collaboration opportunities are everywhere, and from the start Henrique Veiga-Fernandes made the most of them. He's been linking research and clinic, collaborating with health professionals, and hopes to expand these while inspiring others to do the same.

When Maria João Cardoso arrived at the Champalimaud Foundation (CF) in 2011, the building was almost empty. “There was almost no one there”, she recalls. “It was a ghost institution that progressively came to life”.

When Joaquim Teixeira first heard about the Champalimaud Foundation (CF), it wasn’t in the media or a job ad, it was through a friend, who then invited him for a Happy Hour. “There were maybe twenty people at most, but the atmosphere had gravity. You could sense that something meaningful was about to happen and you wanted to be part of it”, he recalls.

The story of Cátia Feliciano and the Champalimaud Foundation (CF) began when she was still finishing her PhD in Neurobiology at Duke University in Durham, in the United States (USA). With a broad smile, she states that her great passion has always been neuroscience, and that when she heard of the plans to build a large research centre in Lisbon dedicated to this field, returning to Portugal became a possibility.

When Gonçalo Lopes first walked into the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência in 2010 – when it was still hosting Champalimaud Foundation (CF) staff before their new building opened – he felt as though he’d crossed into another world. “There was this sense of adventure”, he recalls. “Everyone was completely absorbed in their experiments, standing on the edge of what was known. They weren’t just studying the brain – they were building the tools to study it”.

João Santinha graduated in Biomedical Engineering from the Universidade Nova de Lisboa during one of the longest economic crises Portugal has ever experienced and it was during this time that he heard about the Champalimaud Foundation (CF) for the first time. In a period when there were few opportunities in his field of study, a position opened up on the Scientific Software team that interested him. “I wasn’t selected,” he says smiling, but he adds proudly, “I was invited to another position a few years later.”

For Leonor Beleza, Rui Costa’s arrival represents an invaluable contribution to the development of the Foundation’s scientific and clinical mission in the fields of cancer and neuroscience. She highlights: “The strategic vision and remarkable career of Professor Rui Costa strengthen our ability to generate knowledge and transform it into real benefits for patients and for society. It is also an investment in the future and in the continuity of our ambition and vision.”