The University of Évora (UEVORA) is one of the universities belonging to the Portuguese public higher education system. It currently delivers 40 Bachelor’s degrees, 55 Master’s Degrees, 31 Doctoral Degrees and 10 postgraduate Degrees to 7800 students and employs 701 Lecturers and Researchers and 487 non-academic staff. It hosts 4 Faculties (Arts, Social Sciences, Science and Technology and Nursing), 1 Advanced Teaching and Research School (IIFA-see below) which coordinates 18 Research Units. UEVORA research has lead to 89 Patent applications, more than 15 Spin-offs and 1001 Protocols.
UEVORA mission involves:

• The production of knowledge through scientific and artistic research, experimentation and technological and humanistic development;
• The socialization of knowledge, providing the traditional student population, as well as the working population, with academic qualification through undergraduate, master’s and doctoral courses, ad hoc training courses and informal training throughout life;
• The transmission of knowledge to the community, fostering innovation and business competitiveness, the modernization of public services, as well as the social and cultural development of the broader community.

Its objectives are to to socialize knowledge; shares identical human, cultural and scientific values with the European Community; prioritize strategical alliances with neighbouring and international regions; seeks to expand its mission into the Portuguese-speaking countries, not forgetting, at the same time, the current challenges related to a global “world” for which the students must be well-prepared
The Institute for Advanced Studies and Research (IIFA) is a unit of the University of Évora formed in 2009. Its mission is to accrue, attain and enhance knowledge at the University of Évora by combining and link teaching with research at the University of Évora and promoting the intertwinned areas of different fields of knowledge and supporting the existing R & D units. IIFA aims to provide for further international advancement of the scientific culture at the University of Evora. IIFA priority is to promote, support and organize all the procedures associated with advanced training programs, with regard to monitoring all procedures related to accreditation and processing procedures as well as integration of the students, promoting internationalization of advanced training and research at the university, supporting exchange of researchers and establishment of inter-institutional cooperation protocols, creating synergy between advanced training and available scientific capacity at the R & D units and contributing towards further rationalization and organization of the shared scientific structures used for scientific activity at the University of Évora.

In this context, it provides integral support for research activity in order to ensure the quality of the work of research units, ensures evaluation of their scientific production and articulates their scientific activity with advance training education system, including the 3rd cycles and international degree programs.

The aim of IIFA is to create a set of technical and scientific structures to provide multidisciplinary support for research at the UE and develop all the necessary services to support inter-institutional scientific cooperation and mobilization of all necessary human resources for promotion of scientific activity UEVORA hosts since 2009 the HERCULES Lab for the Study and Conservation of Cultural Heritage. HERCULES is an important node of the Alentejo Regional System for Transfer Innovation (SRTT Alentejo). UEVORA successfully gained support since 2013 from the EACEA agency of the European Commission to establish as coordinating institution the ERASMUS MUNDUS Joint European Master in Archaeological Materials Science (ARCHMAT) with international partners in Italy (Sapienza University of Rome) and Greece (Aristotle University of Thessaloniki).

UEVORA has developed over the years interdisciplinary collaboration with international SMEs and partners to explore new innovative ideas in policy and programs in the field of cultural heritage thus rapidly becoming a national reference in Cultural Heritage/Conservation: an example is the Lifelong Learning START_APP Project (“Interactive Learning Space For Developing Entrepreneurial Skills In Cultural And Assets And Heritage”) by the Programme Leonardo da Vinci of the EU in 2013-2015. UEVORA and IIFA are also coordinating since 2018 the H2020-MSCA-ITN-EJD ED-ARCHMAT training Project with the participation of 8 HEIs, 2 NGOs, 2 SMEs, 3 Museums, 2 Research Centres partners from Portugal, France, Spain, Italy, Brazil, USA and Israel and 13 Early Stage Researchers carrying out multidisciplinary research at PhD level and acquiring transversal and transdisciplinary training skills, competences and knowledge in the Cultural Heritage field. UEVORA is the PT pole of the European Research Infrastructure in Heritage Science (ERIHS). UEVORA created in 2020 the Chair CityUMacau in Sustainable Heritage aimed at developing advanced training and scientific research in Heritage Science as a joint venture with the City of Macau (China).

• Some project realised by the University of Evora are:
  2018 UEVORA Lead Institution – ED-ARCHMAT: European Doctorate in Archaeological and Cultural Heritage Material Sciences – Grant Agreement 766311 HORIZON 2020 – Marie Skłodowska- Curie Actions (MSCA) Innovative Training Networks (ITN) H2020-MSCA-ITN-2017.
• 2018 UEVORA Lead Institution – E+: Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree ARCHMAT: European Master in Archaeological Materials Science Grant Agreement 2018-1468/001/001
• 2020 UEVORA Lead Institution – “High Performance Computing and High-Performance Data Analytics” – 2020-1-PT01-KA103-078153
• 2020 UEVORA Lead Institution – TETRIS: Technology Transfer Innovation Skills in Latin America. 618597-EPP-1-2020-1-PT-EPPKA2-CBHE-JP
• 2019 UEVORA Partner – IPERION HS – Integrating Platforms for the European Research Infrastructure ON Heritage Science – NFRAIA-01-2018-2019
• 2019 UEVORA Partner – DIGI-CHE-ASIA – Enhancing Digital Capacities in Higher Education for Asian Universities – GA 598846
• 2017 UEVORA Partner – ViSuAL – Video-supported education Alliance – 588374-EPP-1-2017-1-NL-EPPKA2-KA.