On September 9, student Francisco Ferreira da Silva successfully defended his thesis titled "Study and Design of Superconducting Electric Motors for Aeronautic Applications", under the supervision of Professor Paulo José da Costa Branco, a faculty member of DEEC. He was awarded the PhD degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering. The defense took place online.

The examination committee was chaired by Dr. Luís Manuel de Jesus Sousa Correia, Full Professor at Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon, and included Dr. Paulo José da Costa Branco, Full Professor at Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon; Dr. Silvio Vaschetto, Associate Professor at the Department of Energy, Politecnico di Torino, Italy; Dr. João Miguel Murta Pina, Associate Professor at the Faculty of Sciences and Technology, NOVA University Lisbon; Dr. Pedro José Gonçalves Ribeiro, Associate Professor at Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon; and Dr. António José Arsénio dos Santos Costa, Collaborating Researcher at INESC-ID: Institute for Systems and Computer Engineering – Research and Development, a recognized expert in the scientific field of the thesis.