25/06/2025

The Serrapilheira grant program includes two researchers from IMPA.

IMPA researchers Bruno Braga and Marcelo Campos are among the 12 scientists selected to have their research projects funded by the Serrapilheira Institute. They were awarded funding in the institute's 8th public call for science support and will receive between R$ 250,000 and R$ 500,000, to be used over five years.

Honored by Serrapilheira's selection of the project, Braga highlighted the importance of the resources for the research. “It is very important for us researchers to be able to travel to conferences and visit co-authors. This support from Serrapilheira will not only allow me to make these visits, but will also allow me to invite co-authors to visit IMPA. This will be very good for my research and also for IMPA students, who will be able to learn more about foreign mathematicians and their research topics. Furthermore, the institute's funding will allow me to attract postdoctoral fellows to work on my project, which is a fantastic opportunity,” he stated.

Braga's project, "How efficiently can we describe mathematical phenomena?", investigates ways to describe mathematical objects efficiently, addressing classification problems in certain abstract spaces. "My goal is to understand to what extent certain mathematical definitions are 'optimal'. Of course, saying that a definition is 'optimal' isn't very precise, so the first thing to do is try to formalize this type of concept. For this, descriptive set theory – a branch of logic that studies definability properties of mathematical objects – provides us with the appropriate tools," he explained.

A key problem in this research area is understanding whether it is possible to efficiently determine which spaces contain such systems. "Beyond the academic importance of the project's questions, I believe that questions of this type also have pedagogical relevance: mathematics is often seen in our society as a kind of mysterious monster. Therefore, eliminating unnecessary complications, such as extra quantifications on abstract objects, is fundamental," concluded the researcher.

Researcher Marcelo Campos' project, "What is the structure of optimal Ramsey graphs?" , proposes to investigate how to combine mathematical structures and randomness to understand the coloring of certain graphs. "The idea is to try to construct certain types of graphs using a combination of algebraic and probabilistic techniques," explained the mathematician, who also highlighted the expectation of national and international collaborations throughout the research. "In this sense, the support of Serrapilheira is fundamental."

In 2023, while still a doctoral student at IMPA, Campos was part of the research group responsible for developing a new algorithm that improved the limit of Ramsey's Theorem — the most significant advance in the field since 1935. The group included Robert Morris (IMPA), Campos's advisor, as well as Simon Griffiths (PUC-Rio) and Julian Sahasrabudhe (University of Cambridge).

Serrapilheira Notice

The 8th public call for proposals from the Serrapilheira Institute selected 12 young researchers in the areas of natural sciences (physics, chemistry, geosciences and life sciences), mathematics and computer science. The selected researchers will also have access to a diversity bonus, ranging from R$ 100,000 to R$ 200,000, intended for the training and inclusion of people from underrepresented groups in their teams.

“We are now in our 8th year of science funding programs, and this is always the most exciting moment – the announcement of the results, when we meet another group of young researchers practicing bold and risky science in Brazil,” said Cristina Caldas, Science Director at Serrapilheira.

With the inclusion of Bruno Braga and Marcelo Campos, IMPA now has seven researchers supported by Serrapilheira. The list also includes Oliver Martin, Vinicius Ramos, Luna Lomonaco, Jethro Van Ekeren, and Felipe Gonçalves.