Bial Foundation

The Bial Foundation was created in 1994 by the Bial pharmaceutical company, together with the Council of Rectors of Portuguese Universities, with the mission to foster the scientific study of the human being from both the physical and spiritual perspectives. Over the years, the Bial Foundation has developed an important relationship with the scientific community, first in Portugal and then worldwide, being a renowned institution, particularly in Neuroscience and Parapsychology research, which aims to stimulate new researches that benefit people, providing more health and enabling new levels of knowledge. Among its activities, the Bial Foundation manages the Prémio Bial de Medicina Clínica, created in 1984, seeking to recognise an intellectual, original work on any freely chosen medical topic in clinical practice. The Bial Award in Biomedicine was created in 2018 to recognise the most outstanding discoveries in the broad biomedical field, distinguishing a work with exceptional quality and scientific relevance published within the last ten years. In 2020, to honour the memory of the great immunologist Maria de Sousa, the Portuguese Medical Association and the Bial Foundation created the Maria de Sousa Award to support young Portuguese researchers with scientific projects in Health Sciences. In 2022, to honour the renowned physician, the family of Nuno Grande, together with ICBAS and the Bial Foundation, created the Nuno Grande Doctoral Scholarships, which aim to support research work by physicians enrolled in a doctoral programme in Fundamental Health Sciences at a Portuguese university. The Bial Foundation also supports scientific research projects for the neurophysiological and mental study of the human being in the areas of Psychophysiology and Parapsychology. In 1996, the Foundation began to organise the Symposia "Behind and Beyond the Brain", gathering world-renowned experts in neurosciences and parapsychology, as well as researchers supported by the Foundation.