The Unit for Multidisciplinary Research In Biomedicine (UMIB) mission is to conduct research applied to clinical medicine in order to accomplishing scientific progress and innovation to improve human health.

UMIB vision to achieve these goals is to dedicate research efforts to find answers to questions arising from clinical practice using a translational approach.

UMIB guiding principles are to focus on high impact diseases based either on the prevalence, morbidity or mortality, as well as on specific rare diseases that require high levels of expertise and multidisciplinary skills to enable implementation of research programs and clinical management protocols. 

UMIB research is dedicated to study epidemiology, disease mechanisms, identification of biomarkers and targeted therapies for human diseases, grounded on four main pillars: Genetics, Metabolism, Immunology and Oncology.

UMIB is based at a Medical School and its University Hospital, namely the Institute of Biomedical Sciences Abel Salazar, University of Porto (ICBAS / UP) and the Centro Hospitalar Universitário do Porto (CHUP). These two institutions are the core of Centro Académico Clínico ICBAS-CHUP that hosts UMIB researchers.

ICBAS and CHUP are located within a close geographic proximity, on two intercommunicating campus, and researchers are either based at research laboratories or clinical departments depending on the expertise and activities conducted, both under the support of the larger organization that ensures successful integration.

UMIB key-resources include:

1. Being based in one of the largest tertiary healthcare centre in the Northern Portugal with accessibility to a large patient population;
2. Having core laboratory facilities appropriate to achieve the research goals, including cell culture, microscopy, flow-cytometers and real-time thermocyclers;
3. Having accumulated a broad spectrum of skills and expertise among the research team spanning from basic to clinical medicine that guarantee the use of different approaches to achieve a common objective, thus creating the basis for the establishment of Translational Research programs.

UMIB managing structure consists of a General Coordinator based at ICBAS that works in close partnership with the Head of DEFI based at CHUP. UMIB researchers are organized in different groups each lead by a Senior Principal Researcher. Despite each research group being dedicated to the study of diseases of specific areas of interest, there is a considerable overlap and some research projects result from a more transversal approach that feeds from various disciplines and benefits from the collaboration of the different research teams within the unit. As a whole, UMIB covers a broad spectrum of medical conditions speeding through this approach the process clinical refinement.