A strategic roadmap for NeurotechEU: evidence-based knowledge and technological co-production

2 de October de 2025

UMH delegation at the Neuroinnovation Summit 2025. From left to right: Jorge Maldonado, Juana Gallar, María del Carmen Lillo, José María Azorín, and Pablo Belmonte. Source: NeurotechEU.

One of NeurotechEU’s collective ambitions is to accelerate responsible neuroinnovation that benefits people and society across Europe. Within this framework, NeurotechEU aims to strengthen collaboration both inside and outside the alliance and to design a technology transfer strategy that transforms neurotechnological advances into high-impact applications for European society and the economy. As part of this goal, Boğaziçi Üniversitesi (BOUN, Turkey), a member of the European University of Brain and Technology – NeurotechEU, hosted the NeurotechEU Neuroinnovation Summit 2025.

Under the theme ‘A Strategic Roadmap for NeurotechEU: Evidence-Based Knowledge and Technology Co-Production’, from 25 to 28 September 2025, representatives from Miguel Hernández University of Elche (UMH) and other partner universities, as well as a range of stakeholders, met to discuss how to translate the outcomes of the Work Package ‘Common Policies and Strategy Development’ into a strategic roadmap to guide research agendas, joint educational programs, and policy dialogues in the coming years.

UMH was represented by Juana Gallar, leader of NeurotechEU at UMH and Director of the Institute for Neuroscience CSIC-UMH, accompanied by José María Azorín, Deputy Vice-Rector for Research Management; María del Carmen Lillo, Director of the UMH Translational Research Center in Physiotherapy; and Jorge Maldonado, UMH representative on the NeurotechEU Student Council and PhD student at the Institute for Neuroscience CSIC-UMH. The UMH delegation was completed by Pablo Belmonte Brissoire, CEO of Newmanbrain, a UMH spin-off company.

During the two-and-a-half-day event, participants worked on transforming outcomes into specific actions tailored to different target audiences. The summit was structured around keynote lectures, roundtables, lightning talks, and parallel working sessions. Gallar moderated two sessions and delivered the lightning talk ‘From Basic Science to the End-User: An FDA-Approved Drug & a Diagnostic Device’. Azorín presented ‘Lessons Learned from Clinical Tests of BCI Systems and Exoskeletons’. Lillo, co-author of the summit’s central document, took part in the panel discussion ‘Understanding Societal Challenges: Applications and Social Initiatives’. Meanwhile, Belmonte presented the evolution of his company as a case study in the nanosymposium ‘Translation into Industry: Challenges, Opportunities, and Success Stories’.

The Neuroinnovation Summit is one of the annual activities organized by NeurotechEU as a European Alliance committed to promoting the education and training of future professionals and researchers in the field of neurotechnology through innovative and up-to-date approaches. In addition to UMH, the NeurotechEU alliance includes seven other universities: Radboud University (Netherlands), Karolinska Institute (Sweden), University of Bonn (Germany), Boğaziçi University (Turkey), Iuliu Hațieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy in Cluj-Napoca (Romania), University of Lille (France), and Reykjavik University (Iceland).

Source: Communication Office of NeurotechEU at UMH (jsantacreu@umh.es)