The CMU Portugal, MIT Portugal, and UT Austin Portugal Partnerships will host their first Phase IV joint Conference on October 30th, bringing together researchers, students, industry leaders, policymakers, and innovation stakeholders from all three communities. Together, they will explore how science, technology, and innovation can drive Portugal's competitiveness and global impact.

On October 29th, CMU Portugal will hold its own Conference "From Ideas to Impact: 20 Years of CMU-Portugal Partnership", dedicated to members of the CMU Portugal Program community.

The CMU Portugal Academy is accepting applications for its Advanced Programs: AI, Data Science, and Machine Learning; AI Product Management; and AI for User Experience Design. 

The deadline for applications is August 31st, 2026, and each program has 25 available positions.

On July 15th, CMU Portugal was part of the inaugural edition of the “Ciência e Inovação” (Science and Innovation) Conference in Lisbon. The Program was part of the “International Partnerships for Excellence” session, with the panel "FCT’s International Partnerships with American Universities", jointly organized by the CMU Portugal, MIT Portugal, and UT Austin Portugal programs.

The new 9 Ph.D. students, with scholarships funded by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, will start their journey in Fall 2026, pursuing a full-time program consisting of 2 years at CMU and 3 years at a Portuguese university.

Until December 2026, 19 visiting research scholars from Portuguese Institutions will visit Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) in the Information and Communication Technologies field: 7 faculty & researchers and 12 master’s students & recent graduates, supported by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia. 

Seven new exploratory projects were selected for funding by CMU Portugal through Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia. The awarded projects across five main areas - neuroscience, brain interfaces, robotics, AI, and software - will be led by seven Portuguese academic and research institutions in collaboration with five departments at CMU.

José M. F. Moura, Philip L. and Marsha Dowd University Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and director of the CMU Portugal Program at CMU, received an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from York University’s Lassonde School of Engineering (Canada) during its June 12th convocation ceremony.

Mahmoud Tavakoli, CMU Portugal long-time collaborator and director of the “Soft and Printed Microelectronics Laboratory” (ISR-Coimbra), won a €150,000 Proof of Concept grant from the European Research Council (ERC) to develop the wearable tech project "KineSense". 

Manuel Reis Carneiro‘s thesis, “High‑fidelity on‑skin bioelectronics through advanced soft and sustainable materials” won the 2025 Best Ph.D. Thesis Award by the Applied Sciences MDPI journal. Manuel  graduated in 2025, earning his dual degree Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Carnegie Mellon and Universidade de Coimbra.

Marta Freitas, CMU Portugal Dual Ph.D. student in Electrical and Computer Engineering, is the first co-author of the paper "Liquid metal nano-gyroid stretchable transparent conductor" recently published in the Nature NPJ Flexible Electronics, about an innovative technology inspired by dragonfly wing nanostructure.

Afonso Pinho Lourenço, CMU Portugal Affiliated Ph.D. student in Computer Science at FEUP do Porto and researcher at GECAD, was selected for a “R&D@USA” grant from Fundação Luso-Americana para o Desenvolvimento (FLAD).

On July 20, nine CMU Portugal students took a well-deserved break from their studies in Pittsburgh to visit Fallingwater, the iconic house museum designed by renowned American architect Frank Lloyd Wright.