Isabel Sá-Corrreia was the founder and coordinator of the scientific area of Biological Sciences at Instituto Superior Técnico. Since 2020, she has been included in Stanford’s annual list of the world’s most cited scientists. She has mentored 18 PhD researchers and has been the main scientific supervisor of 33 PhD theses and 65 MSc theses. She has led Técnico teams in four EU projects and more than 30 national projects. For these and other reasons, Isabel Sá-Correia received the title of Emeritus Professor of Universidade de Lisboa on 26 June, at a ceremony that preceded the presentation of the Universidade de Lisboa / Caixa Geral de Depósitos Scientific Awards. She became the first Técnico professor to receive this honour.
Isabel Sá-Correia recalled her academic and research career, and emphasised that “Técnico and Universidade de Lisboa have a very significant number of brilliant professors”. The retired full professor said she was “unable to ignore” the fact that this distinction, “which I’m very honoured by”, had been awarded “to a woman whose academic career has developed without any expectation of honours, at a time when gender balance was not a concern”.
“I hope the next generations will steer Técnico’s Biological Sciences ship towards excellence, whether the sea is calm or not”, she shared at the end of her speech generating a standing ovation.
The President of Técnico, Rogério Colaço, highlighted “the professor’s concern about the future and what we have today, what is wrong and what can be improved, what we leave for the next generations”. “I wear with great pride this invisible medal of having Isabel Sá-Correia as a friend”, he shared. The Head of the Department of Bioengineering, João Pedro Conde, said that summarising Isabel Sá-Correia’s accomplishments “is a very difficult task due to the diversity of such a full career”.
Luís Ferreira, Rector of Universidade de Lisboa, said it had been “a pleasure” to work with Isabel Sá-Correia and that her presence “is missed” at the ULisboa General Council, of which she was a member from 2013 to 2022. “Her determination and firmness allowed us to solve so many problems that sometimes seemed unsolvable”, he recalled.
