Skip to main content
< Back to news
Members of the current Board of Directors of ACER: From left to right: Josep M. Monfort (IRTA), member; Jordi Galí (CREI), member; Josep Samitier (IBEC), president; Ramon Gomis (IDIBAPS, member, and Joan Gómez Pallarès (ICAC), secretary © ACER (Photo: Ramon Josa).
 06.02.2015

Josep Samitier elected new president of of the Associació Catalana d’Entitats de Recerca

On 30 January, the Extraordinary General Assembly of the he Catalan Association of Research Centres (Associació Catalana d'Entitats de Recerca - ACER) appointged Josep Samitier -current director of the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC), located in the Parc Científic de Barcelona - as the new president of the association for the next 4 years. Mr Samitier is replacing Lluis Torner, director of the Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO). 

Josep Samitier, professor of Electronics at the Faculty of Physics of the UB and co-director of IBEC, is also the executive director of the campus of International excellence HUBc, which gathers thirty public and private organizations from Barcelona’s metropolitan area which work on health issues. He has devoted his career to research, teaching and university management.

In research, he is expert on nanotechnology applied to biomedicine.  He coordinates the Spanish Nanomedicine Platform. He is also the Spanish representative of several International committees of nanotechnology applied to health issues.

On the field of university management, he was the Head of the Department of Electronics, Vice-Rector for International Policy, Vice-Rector of Innovation and acting Rector of the UB, as well as deputy director of the PCB. Samitier received the City of Barcelona Award for technological innovation in 2003.

Consolidating Catalonia as an international benchmark in scientific and technological research

The Catalan Association of Research Centres (Associació Catalana d’Entitats de Recerca – ACER) was established on 22 March 2003 with the mission to consolidate Catalonia as an international benchmark in scientific and technological research. ACER groups non-profit institutions with legal personality constituted in Catalonia, most of them with strong and close ties with universities and with a significant share from the Generalitat de Catalunya and the support from various public and private actors. The first honorary president of the association was the current Minister of Economy, Andreu Mas-Colell.

The main activity of ACER centres is R&D encompassing all fields of knowledge, including the social sciences and humanities, life sciences and health, natural sciences and mathematics and technology. Their aim is to help identify priorities and scientific and research policies in Catalonia and to streamline the implementation and management in the areas they represent.