Venezuelan technical university offering biodegradable polymer research and biomedical sensing expertise through MSCA-RISE researcher exchanges with European consortia.
Universidad Simón Bolívar (USB) is a leading Venezuelan technical university with research groups active in both polymer materials science and biomedical engineering. In H2020, they participated exclusively as third-party organizations in MSCA-RISE exchanges — meaning they functioned as researcher-hosting or researcher-sending institutions enabling scientist mobility between Venezuela and Europe. Their most recent engagement was in the synthesis and characterization of novel biodegradable polyesters, including crystallization behavior and morphological analysis of biobased polymer systems. An earlier involvement placed them within a biomedical sensing consortium focused on wrist and arm technologies for detecting cardiac arrhythmias.
BIODEST (2018-2022) focused on synthesis, characterization, structure and properties of novel biodegradable polyesters, with USB contributing to crystallization and morphological characterization work.
Keywords from BIODEST — crystallization, morphological characterization — indicate hands-on laboratory characterization capability for polymer microstructure.
WASTCArD (2015-2018) addressed wrist and arm sensing technologies for cardiac arrhythmia detection, placing USB in an applied biomedical engineering context.
USB's first H2020 project (WASTCArD, 2015-2018) placed them in a biomedical engineering network focused on wearable cardiac sensing — a domain with no retained keywords, suggesting limited or supporting involvement. Their second project (BIODEST, 2018-2022) shifted entirely into polymer chemistry, with a dense keyword cluster around biodegradable polyesters, biobased materials, crystallization, and morphological characterization. These two engagements are so different in domain that they likely represent separate research departments rather than a single evolving institutional strategy.
The most recent and keyword-rich engagement points toward sustainable materials science — specifically biodegradable and biobased polymers — which aligns well with growing European demand for green materials, suggesting this is the more active research thread worth pursuing for future collaboration.
USB has participated exclusively as a third party in MSCA-RISE projects, a role typical for non-EU institutions that host or dispatch researchers under staff exchange agreements rather than leading project design or receiving direct EC funding. This means they bring research infrastructure and local expertise to European networks rather than driving project objectives. Across just two projects, they have connected with 19 partners in 14 countries, indicating that the consortia they join are broad and internationally distributed.
USB has accumulated 19 unique consortium partners across 14 countries through just two MSCA-RISE projects, reflecting the inherently multinational character of those exchanges rather than an independently built network. Their connections are European-facing, typical of Latin American institutions integrated into EU researcher mobility schemes.
As a Venezuelan technical university, USB offers something rare in European H2020 networks: a Latin American academic anchor for MSCA-RISE staff exchanges, with research groups capable of hosting or sending scientists in both materials chemistry and biomedical engineering. For EU consortium builders seeking to include a non-European dimension in an MSCA-RISE proposal, USB represents an accessible and institutionally established partner. Their biodegradable polymer expertise is particularly relevant given tightening EU regulations on packaging and single-use materials.
