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Networking has been a “trademark” of the LA and supports most of the ongoing activity of our laboratory. The main objectives are I) to establish national, regional and international sustainable networks, II) to promote human resources, equipment and technology sharing and transference, with emphasis on mobility and, III) to translate this into scientific productivity gain and cost optimization.

An important secondary objective is to use the networking process itself to leverage all the LA’s capacity to lead and support regional/thematic (European, Iberian and CPLP) research activities and enable North-South technology transference, especially regarding African and South American partners.

Major Achievements:

Networking constitutes one of the pillar objectives of the LA itself and its extensively described in the corresponding section. At national level, the LA has a leading role in several specific technical networks (Malaria, Migrant’s health, Traveller’s health, Leishmania, Proteomics). These are formal networks that run for some years and, in most cases, linked to equivalent or similar international networks integrated by the LA. Moreover, CMDT has established bilateral network connections with several other Portuguese institutions and laboratories, including groups of the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Universidade do Porto, Universidade do Algarve, Universidade de Coimbra, Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência, etc. These network agreements started in specific fields of research and evolved to more generic aspects of activity, including now student and scientist’s exchange, cross-participation in global projects, equipment sharing and training programs. The networking activity includes non-academic institutions like NGO’s, civil associations and special population-based organizations (e.g. migrants and refugees) that frequently integrate research projects.

CMDT groups integrate more than 20 international networks in various fields of research and described elsewhere in this report. We wish to highlight in this section two networks that have been recently implemented by CMDT and are now an important instrument of our activities.

RIDES: Rede de Investigadores dos Países de Língua Portuguesa is a formal network founded in March 2006, in Brazil, led by Angola, Brazil and Portugal (CMDT-LA). The network was joined by Portuguese speaking scientists working in Tropical Health Research and was complemented by the implementation of an on-line bibliographic platform and a PhD program (see PROCAPS) for African students at CMDT-LA. Several training actions in African countries and workshops and seminars were deployed since 2006 under this network’s activities.

Iberian Platform for Malaria was constituted in 2007 and includes more than 60 scientists from Portugal and Spain, covering all major aspects of malaria research. This network will focus in four main types of activity: Cooperation, Capacity building, Mobility & Information dissemination.

O Projecto Aventura Social, sediado na Faculdade de Motricidade Humana da Universidade  Técnica de Lisboa (FMH) e Centro da Malária e Outras Doenças Tropicais / Instituto de Higiene e Medicina Tropical da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, tem vindo a desenvolver diversas investigações no domínio da promoção da saúde e comportamento social.

The European and Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership  is a partnership between 14 EU countries, Switzerland and Norway on one hand, and African countries on the other. It aims to join relevant European national research programmes and their African partnerships to develop new clinical tools against AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.

Mecanismos de controle e imunoprofilaxia na leishmaniose (ref. 207RT0308), Fiocruz S. Salvador da Bahía, Brasil (A. Barral), Centro Nacional de Diagnóstico e Investigación en Endemo-Epidemias, Argentina (O.D. Salomón), Universidade de Navarra, Espanha.   (J.M.I. Garreta),   Centro de Biología Molecular “Severo Ochoa”,  Espanha (M.S. Álvarez),  Instituto de Medicina Tropical Alexander Von Humboldt, Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia, Peru (J. Arevalo) e o CMDT-LA, IHMT-UNL (G. Santos-Gomes).  

 EN-HERA! European Network For The Promotion Of Sexual & Reproductive Health & Rights Of Refugees & Asylum Seekers

The recognition of sexual and reproductive health, health rights and needs of refugees and asylum seekers in the EU has only recently started to develop. There are no binding EU regulations for the integration of these health rights in reception and integration policies that guarantee full entitlement of refugees and asylum seekers to a comprehensive range of services. This situation is in sharp contrast with the EU commitment to promote and protect Sexual and Reproductive Health rights as a basic human right worldwide.

O European Network on Imported Infectious Disease Surveillance (TropNetEurop), é uma rede electrónica de Centros clínicos europeus relacionados com doenças infecciosas importadas. Esta rede foi concebida para detectar eficientemente infecções emergentes com impacto potencial ao nível regional, nacional ou global. O registo de Vigilância Sentinela é executado pelos sites participantes através de um sistema electrónico normalizado.

ALCUE HEALTH and quality of life platform

 This is a network project which convokes expert professionals, researchers, decision makers and representatives of agencies, interested in making alliances, in order to analyze relevant problems related to health, to identify possible strategies and solutions which can help improve health conditions in industrialized or developing countries.

The consumption of legal and illegal drugs represents, in particular for young persons, a clear and increasing health risk in many countries of Europe. Risks combined with drug consumption are often underestimated preferably by young persons. In addition to this, consequential damages and long term sanitary influences and illnesses are not often perceived as a risk applying to the own person by young persons.

The development of new therapeutics for important parasitic diseases of humans is essential for the control of these pathogens. Such efforts rely on screening potentially effective compounds in pathogen growth/multiplication assays, both in vitro and in vivo. However, in the case of the parasites that cause malaria and leishmaniasis, these assays have technical limitations that potentially restrict drug development, so the ability to derive transgenic parasites expressing proteins such as green fluorescent protein (GFP) and luciferase has opened up new possibilities for high throughput drug screening.

This workplan provides an update of progress and activities of a network of investigators with overlapping expertise to develop and assess transgenic parasites and to assess their use in the development of antiparasitic drugs. The network, established in 2004, continues to provide a broad array of expertise 
to ensure timely development of tools and assessment of their utility for drug screening and technology sharing. Additionally, there has already been and will continue to be a strong component of training for transfer of technology among the network partners.

COST 857 – “apicomplexan biology in the post-genomic era”.

COST is one of the longest-running instruments supporting co-operation among scientists and researchers across Europe. COST now has 35 member countries and enables scientists to collaborate in a wide spectrum of activities in research and technology.

As from 1 June 2006 a new Domain structure with the respective Committees will become operational and replace the previous TC structure.

COST is an intergovernmental network which is scientifically completely self-sufficient with nine scientific COST Domain Committees formed by some of the most outstanding scientists of the European scientific community. The scientific quality control is the main responsibility of the COST scientific Domain Committees which follow very rigorous evaluation procedures established by the COST Committee of Senior Officials (CSO) involving the mandatory use of external peer reviewers.

COST B22 drug development for parasitic diseases

The main objective of the Action is to support the identification, evaluation and development of new drugs for the treatment of protozoal diseases, with particular emphasis on the tropical diseases malaria, leishmaniasis, human African trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness) and South American trypanosomiasis (Chagas disease). Research on other widespread parasitic diseases, for example amoebiasis, and opportunistic infections will also be supported.

Health Behaviour in School-aged Children (HBSC) is a cross-national research study conducted in collaboration with the WHO Regional Office for Europe. The study aims to gain new insight into, and increase our understanding of young people's health and well-being, health behaviours and their social context.  HBSC was initiated in 1982 by researchers from three countries and shortly afterwards the project was adopted by The first cross-national survey was conducted in 1983/84, the second in 1985/86 and since then data collection has been carried out every four years using a common research protocol. The most recent survey, the seventh in the series, was conducted in 2005/06.

Integrated Consortium on Ticks and Tick-borne Diseases (ICTTD-3)

This is a Coordinated Action (CA) financially supported by INCO, the International Cooperation program of the European Union.

The aim of the CA is to support a research program on tick-borne diseases jointly executed by a consortium of 43 institutions in 29 different countries (directed by a Steering Committee composed by Gervásio Bechara (Sao Paulo State University, Brazil), Mohamed Darghouth (Ecole Vétérinaire Nationale, Tunisia), Andrew Tait (Glasgow University, UK), Virgílio do Rosario (Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal), Jabber Ahmed (Forschungsinstitut Borstel, Germany and Frans Jongejan (Utrecht University, the Netherlands and University of Pretoria,  South Africa) (coordinator).

The CA will focus on tick-host-pathogen interactions to identify concrete means of control that reduce the prevalence of tick-borne diseases in (sub)tropical countries. The current ICTTD-3 program is a continuation of ICTTD-1 (1996-2000) and ICTTD-2 (2000-2004, with an European Commission approved request for extension from July 2004 to December 2004, making it possible to combine the final meeting of the ICTTD-2 concerted action with the start-up meeting of ICTTD-3 coordination action) and has developed into a large consortium of researchers working on ticks and tick-borne diseases, with over 1000 registered scientists worldwide.

After 10 years, 3rd project under the 6th FWP,  as coordination activity under F Jongegan Utrecht University, on tick transmitted diseases; Organization of  international meeting and support of booklets, CD´s  and mobility within a international programme.

Emerging diseases in a changing European environment (EDEN)

This network integrates research groups in 48 leading institutes from 24 countries. http://www.eden-fp6project.net EDEN (Emerging Diseases in a changing European eNvironment) is an Integrated Project of the European Commission that aims to identify and catalogue those European ecosystems and environmental conditions which can influence the spatial and temporal distribution and dynamics of human pathogenic agents. The project develops and co-coordinates a set of generic methods, tools and skills such as predictive models, early warning and monitoring tools which can be used by decision makers for risk assessment, decision support for intervention and public health policies. EDEN integrates research in 48 leading institutes from 24 countries. The eco-geographical diversity of the project area covers all relevant European eco-systems from the polar circle in the North to the Mediterranean basin and its link with West Africa in the South, and from Portugal in the West to the Danube delta in the East. EDEN is organised into a series of vertical Sub-Projects linked together by a series of Integrative Activities that include biodiversity monitoring, environmental change detection, disease modelling, remote sensing and image interpretation, information and communication.

Procura - Rede Portuguesa de Proteómica

ProCura is a virtual network organization whose members are laboratories of Portuguese research institutions of excellence or renowned universities. The network aims at bringing together these Portuguese laboratories to share their expertise and facilities to form a collaborative platform on the functional proteomics technology, in order to contribute to the understanding of gene function in the post-genomic era. The Portuguese Proteomics Network - ProCura- has recently joined The European Proteomics Association (EuPa).

Plataforma Ibérica da Malária

At the end of 2007, a total of 65 researchers in the research area of malaria presented and discussed the establishment and objectives of an Iberian Malaria Platform "Plataforma Ibérica de Malaria". This took place in Lisboa.

RIDES: Rede de Investigadores dos Países de Língua Portuguesa

RIDES: Uma Comunidade Científica de Língua Portuguesa em Construção

O espírito da Comunidade dos Países de Língua Portuguesa - CPLP, o contacto científico e cultural e algumas vontades, formalizaram há quase um ano, em Teresina, Piaui, durante o Congresso da Sociedade Brasileira de Medicina Tropical, uma Rede de Investigadores em Saúde Tropical dos Países CPLP. Ela foi constituída tendo como objectivos principais o progresso científico e técnico dos países da CPLP e foram estabelecidas, logo então, as ferramentas que utilizaria: disseminação de informação, transferência de  tecnologia e saberes e procura e utilização comum de recursos.