Research Groups

The Paisagens e Sociedades | Landscapes and Societies (LandS) group studies the landscapes and their physical, biological and cultural characteristics, which preserve the marks of the past and of human action in the territories of contemporary societies. In this context, the concepts of landscape and society are complementary, since urban or rural landscapes always represent the result of historical processes that are important in order to understand their interaction with the environment and the specific resources, powers and social practices that shaped them.

The Projeto Design e Tecnologia | Design and Technology (DeTech) group explores design-oriented research methodologies with an inclusive view of the individual, society, the built environment and artefacts. Its scientific activities encompass complementary areas of knowledge with the ambition to promote innovative and sustainable results in the construction and design of products that fit into contemporary sociocultural, economic and environmental contexts.

The Space and Representation group (SpaceR) is comprised by researchers from a multidisciplinary set of scientific areas. The group aims to analyse intersecting ideas and projects and develop fundamental and applied research. The disciplinary backgrounds span five subgroups (Architecture and Urbanism, Geography and Tourism, Heritage and Museology, History, as well as the Visual Arts). The group’s transdisciplinary spirit fosters the desired level of reflection and theoretical derivation on common concerns, such as the built environment, cultural legacy and strategic valorisation, together with applied survey techniques and means of representation of the built, inhabited and imagined space.