Inaugurated on the 5th of October 2010, the ‘Champalimaud Centre for the Unknown’ is home to the Champalimaud Foundation, which was formed in 2004 following the death of influential Portuguese businessman António de Sommer Champalimaud. The businessman bequeathed a €500 million investment to the foundation. His vision was to create a centre for multidisciplinary and translational scientific investigation, within the areas of neurosciences and cancer research. “The centre is a haven for scientific research, and something Portugal should be proud of,” said a spokesperson for IMP, a Lisbon-based sales and marketing company. “There’s a real chance that we could see some very important discoveries being made there.”
The Centre comprises of two buildings. Building A houses diagnostic and treatment units, as well as the basic research laboratories, and Building B hosts an auditorium, exhibition area, and Darwin’s restaurant. In the Foundation’s words, it “expresses and reinforces the objectives of fostering scientific excellence and of celebrating discoveries while generously allowing access and enjoyment of the area to the general public.” More than 180 scientists work in the laboratory, carrying out groundbreaking research on the neural basis of behaviour, and within the field of cancer research. IMP commented that it was an extremely innovative leap to combine scientific research with educating and informing the public, in one building.
The Centre is soon to be home to a specially-equipped, single-dose image-guided radiotherapy unit, the most advanced cancer-treatment technology in the world. While the centre already uses similar technology, the new multi-million-euro unit will be equipped with specialised tools and new features that will make it unique on a global scale. The new machine will offer the ability to eliminate tumours, in a fourth of the time of conventional treatment, and with minimal side-effects. “This is groundbreaking technology,” said our source from International Marketing Portugal. “It should go a long way towards keeping Portugal at the forefront of the scientific community.”
The machine has already arrived in Portugal, following manufacture in California, and is currently being tested and calibrated, before treatments begin on eligible patients. The equipment is expected to be up and running by the end of April this year.
http://www.theportugalnews.com/cgi-bin/article.pl?id=1151-2
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