Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena (UPCT) is a higher education public institution in Spain, with long experience in teaching technical and business studies with approximately 1,100 employees (700 for teaching and 400 for administrative staff) and 6.000 students. UPCT is highly committed with the promotion of comprehensive education, quality teaching and research, as well as technology transfer according to the guiding principles of equity, transparency, and good governance. The University has 7 Engineering Schools and 1 Business School in charge of the organization of 24 degrees, 15 Master Programs and 13 Doctorate Programs.
UPCT offers a Bachelor Degree in Biomedical Engineering (https://estudios.upct.es/grado/5211/inicio) since 2021, with 98 students enrolled in the first two years of the program, expecting to reach a number of 160 students by 2025 after the complete deployment of the 4 year academic program; being the most demanded engineering bachelor program of the Region of Murcia. Internships at hospitals, medical technology companies or international research centres are mandatory for all students in the 8th semester.
UPCT is engaged with its community and have strong relationships with both, economic and social agents of the Murcia Region with around 40 collaboration agreements with regional and national corporates, through industry and Business Chairs (among them Telefónica, Indra, Banco de Santander). In relation to this project, the UPCT holds a close relationship with the Public Health Service of the Region of Murcia (SMS) and with the industry cluster for digital transformation of healthcare systems (TICBIOMED https://ticbiomed.org). UPCT is also in close connection with medical technology companies located in our region, such as Grifols (https://www.grifols.com) and Lorca Marin (https://www.lorcamarin.es) as well as with the emerging innovative med-tech start-up ecosystem with companies such as Cella-Medical (https://www.cellams.com), Flowgy (https://www.flowgy.com), PQx (https://planificacionquirurgica.com), and Inbentus (https://www.inbentus.com) founded by entrepreneurial UPCT students, which are now demanding new professional profiles related to our proposal.
For the UPCT integration with other technical universities and internationalization is a key element for future success, having a broad experience in managing student and professors mobilities, participating in international research and institutional projects, with a wide network of partners in Europe, Asia, Africa and South America. The UPCT is currently part of the EUt + project together with 7 other European universities. As a result of this initiative, fruitful partnerships have been established with the Riga Technical University (RTU) and Technical University of Cluj-Napoca (TUCN) prior to the preparation of this proposal.
The UPCT has the experience, the structures, and the human and material resources to carry out the project. In this sense, after the agreement with the Public Health Service of the Region of Murcia (SMS), a joint in-hospital Research Laboratory for Development and Innovation in Biomedical Technologies (LIDITEB-SMS-UPCT http://liditeb.sait.upct.es) was set. The lab was conceived for the development of new medical products and procedures through the adoption of advanced Industry 4.0 key enabling technologies such as 3D modelling, virtual and augmented reality, 3D bio/printing, hybrid CNC-SLA manufacturing for metal implants and plastic injection for the development of new medical devices. This technological dotation is complimentary to that available at the Industrial Design and Scientific Calculation Service (SEDIC https://www.upct.es/sait/es/sedic) for 3D printing, 3D scanning, virtual reality and CNC manufacturing as well as at the UPCT-Fablab (https://www.sedicupct-fablab.upct.es) which were used for the production of protective equipment and medical devices during the pandemic (http://www.proyectos-covid19.upct.es).