Alexandre Quintanilha in the European Commission's Consulting Commission for Science and Technology

Alexandre Quintanilha, former IBMC director, is one of scientists of the Informal Consulting Commission for Science and Technology created by the president of the European Commission Durão Barroso.

European Commission President José Manuel Barroso announced on 27 February the creation of an advisory commission on science and technology.

The Science and Technology Advisory Council includes a cross-section of advisors – from universities, non-governmental groups and businesses. The council is to provide independent information and advice on an array of scientific and technology issues.
The creation of the council and the earlier appointment of a staff science advisor reflect both the Commission's increasing focus on science and technology to boost European competitiveness, but also a need to deal with political minefields.

The former IBMC director, Alexandre Quintanilha is one of the member of the advisory council.

Alexandre Quintanilha was born in Lourenço Marques, now Maputo, on 1945. His father, Aurélio Quintanilha, was Portuguese and one of the first scientists to study fungi and his mother was German, from Berlin. The family moved to Mozambique in the 1940s, where Alexandre was born. Quintanilha completed his secondary school studies in Lourenço Marques, then went to South Africa to study at university level, where he completed his B.Sc. in theoretical physics in 1967. He completed his Ph.D. in solid state physics in 1972 in the University of Paris and switched his focus to biology on moving to California in 1972. He worked for nearly 18 years at the University of California, Berkeley, in the USA, before returning to Portugal in 1990 and becoming director of the Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular of the University of Porto.

The advisory council also include: Alan Atkisson (Sweden), Ferdinando Beccalli-Falco (Italy), Victor de Lorenzo (Spain), Tamás F. Freund (Hungary), Susan M. Gasser (Switzerland), Søren Molin (Denmark), Joanna Pininska (Poland), Ortwin Renn (Germany), Riitta Salmelin (Finland), Pat Sandra (Belgium), Hans-Joachim Schellnhuber (Germany), Roberta Sessoli (Italy), Cedric Villani (France) and Ada E. Yonath (Israel).