Following a new internal competitive internal tender, the Evaluation Panel for the IN2PAST 2023/2024 Exploratory Projects Funding Competition announced the funding of six exploratory projects.

The six projects selected were: “HELP. Heritage, Environment, Liberty and People. Archaeology of the Spanish refugee camps in Barrancos, Alentejo“, coordinated by Xurxo Ayán Vila; “W.Box.Project – A caixa de Ward como objeto pedagógico na divulgação da História da Ciência” [W.Box.Project – Ward’s box as a pedagogical object in the dissemination of the History of Science], coordinated by Sara Albuquerque; “Coisas de Portugal: Negociações identitárias e usos de cultura material portuguesa num quadro de migrações transnacionais” [Things from Portugal: Negotiations on identity and uses of Portuguese material culture within a framework of transnational migrations], coordinated by Filomena Silvano; “From Land to Earth. Connections for Sustainable Territories”, coordinated by Rebeca Blanco-Rotea; “SuitNanoMusic: Suitability of nanomaterials for preservation of tangible musical cultural heritage“, coordinated by Penka Ilieva Girginova; and “The Materials and Techniques of Jan van Goyen: A Technical Study of Eight Small Paintings“, coordinated by Sara Valadas.

The call aimed at providing “financial support for collective projects of an exploratory nature aimed at formulating research hypotheses leading to the preparation of future applications for international and national competitive funding” and each selected project included researchers from, at least, three research units of IN2PAST.

The Evaluation Panel was chaired by the President of the Coordinating Commission of the Scientific Council of IN2PAST, Nélia Dias, and composed of one representative of each Research Unit in the Coordinating Commission of the Scientific Council of IN2PAST, replaced by appointment when in situations of conflict of interest or justified unavailability: Cidália Ferreira da Silva (Lab2PT), Elisabete Pereira (IHC), Manuel Pedro Ferreira (CESEM), Mariana Pinto dos Santos (IHA), Marta Prista (CRIA), Milene Gil (HERCULES Laboratory), and Rute Sousa Matos (CHAIA). Also present were the IN2PAST Board members António Candeias (HERCULES Laboratory) and José Neves (IHC).