Nuno Sousa, MSc, PhD

Assistant Professor / Applied Sciences, Environment and Society
Department of Sciences and Technology, Universidade Aberta
Researcher @ INESC Coimbraa

Nuno Miguel Marques de Sousa is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Sciences and Technology (DCeT) of Universidade Aberta (Open University of Portugal, UAb), where he has been since 2008.
He graduated in Physics and pursued an MSc in that field at the University of Coimbra. He then obtained a PhD in Physics, Mathematics and Computer Science at the Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen, in the Netherlands, which he followed with post-doc positions at the University of Oporto and Instituto Superior Técnico. Originally a researcher in Theoretical Physics (string theory), where he published several journal articles, he has since moved his interests towards applied research and is currently working on Operational Research applied to Civil Engineering, focusing on Urban and Transport Planning. This broad subject also brought him in contact with Decision Support Systems, Multicriteria Analysis, Geographic Information Systems, Smart Cities and Sustainability. As a teacher, N.Sousa has lectured in many different subjects related to his fields of expertise and served as coordinator and vice-coordinator of several MSc and PhD courses at Universidade Aberta. He also held positions in collegiate councils of UAb and participated in the training of high school teachers for the Portuguese educational system.
He is a senior researcher in the DSS group at INESCC since 2012 and led several projects within this group and with European funding. A member of the ICE Municipal Engineer editorial board, N.Sousa often champions special issues for that journal and other journals as well, having won the James Hill Best Paper Award, ICE (London, 2017).
A flexible researcher with skills in multiple fields, his publications spread through many journals, from Physics to Civil Engineering. Some of the top journals where he published feature Physics Letters B, Nuclear Physics B, Computer-Aided Civil and Infrastructure Engineering, Transport Policy, Journal of Transport Geography, and Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science.

Selected publications in scientific international journals:

Monteiro, J., Sousa, N., Coutinho-Rodrigues, J., & Natividade-Jesus, E. (2024) Benchmarking real and ideal cities - a multicriteria analysis of city performance based on urban form. Cities 150(2024). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2024.105040

Monteiro J, Sousa N, Coutinho-Rodrigues J, Natividade-Jesus E (2024). Challenges Ahead for Sustainable Cities: An Urban Form and Transport System Review. Energies, 17(2):409. https://doi.org/10.3390/en17020409

Monteiro J, Sousa N, Pais F, Coutinho-Rodrigues J, Natividade-Jesus E (2023). Planning cities for pandemics: review of urban and transport planning lessons from COVID-19. Municipal Engineer, 176(3):125-138. https://doi.org/10.1680/jmuen.22.00030

Monteiro J, Carrilho AC, Sousa N, Oliveira LKd, Natividade-Jesus E, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2023). Do We Live Where It Is Pleasant? Correlates of Perceived Pleasantness with Socioeconomic Variables. Land, 12(4):878. https://doi.org/10.3390/land12040878

Monteiro J, Para M, Sousa N, Natividade-Jesus E, Ostorero C, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2023). Filling in the Spaces: Compactifying Cities towards Accessibility and Active Transport. ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information, 12(3):120. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi12030120

Monteiro J, Sousa N, Natividade-Jesus E, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2023). The Potential Impact of Cycling on Urban Transport Energy and Modal Share: A GIS-Based Methodology. ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information, 12(2):48. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi12020048

Sousa N, Monteiro J, Natividade-Jesus E, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2023). The impact of geometric and land use elements on the perceived pleasantness of urban layouts. Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science, 50(3):740-756. https://doi.org/10.1177/23998083221129879

Freiria S, Sousa N, Calvo-Poyo F (2022). Spatial analysis of the impact of transport accessibility on regional performance: A study for Europe. Journal of Transport Geography, 102, 103371. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2022.103371

Pais F, Monteiro J, Sousa N, Coutinho-Rodrigues J, Natividade-Jesus E (2022). A multicriteria methodology for maintenance planning of cycling infrastructure. Engineering Sustainability, 175(5):248-264. https://doi.org/10.1680/jensu.21.00088

Monteiro J, Sousa N, Natividade-Jesus E, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2022). Benchmarking City Layouts—A Methodological Approach and an Accessibility Comparison between a Real City and the Garden City. Sustainability, 14(9):5029. (Editor's choice) https://doi.org/10.3390/su14095029 https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/9/5029

Sousa N, Rodrigues A (2021). Aceitação da energia nuclear em Portugal: um estudo exploratório. Revista de Ciências da Computação, 16:137-150. https://doi.org/10.34627/rcc.v16i0.269 https://journals.uab.pt/index.php/rcc/article/view/269 https://repositorioaberto.uab.pt/handle/10400.2/11545

Bidarra J, Sousa N (2020). Implementing Mobile Learning Within Personal Learning Environments: A Study of Two Online Courses. International Review of Research in Open and Distributed Learning, 21(4):181-198. https://doi.org/10.19173/irrodl.v21i4.4891

Sousa N, Almeida A, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2020). A multicriteria methodology for estimating consumer acceptance of alternative powertrain technologies. Transport Policy, 85:18-32. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tranpol.2019.10.003

Natividade-Jesus E, Almeida A, Sousa N, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2019). A Case Study Driven Integrated Methodology to Support Sustainable Urban Regeneration Planning and Management. Sustainability, 11(15):4129-ff. https://doi.org/10.3390/su11154129

Almeida A, Sousa N, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2019). Quest for Sustainability: Life-Cycle Emissions Assessment of Electric Vehicles Considering Newer Li-Ion Batteries. Sustainability, 11(8):2366-ff. https://doi.org/10.3390/su11082366

Sousa N, Pais F, Natividade-Jesus E, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2019). Design of pedestrian network friendliness maps. Municipal Engineer, 172(4):224-232. https://doi.org/10.1680/jmuen.18.00051

Sousa N, Alçada-Almeida L, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2019) Multi-objective model for optimizing railway infrastructure asset renewal. Engineering Optimization, 51(10):1777-1793. https://doi.org/10.1080/0305215X.2018.1547716

Sousa N, Coutinho-Rodrigues J, Natividade-Jesus E (2018). Bike-Index – um índice de acessibilidade velocípede recorrendo a programação em ambiente SIG. Revista de Ciências da Computação, 13:67-88. https://journals.uab.pt/index.php/rcc/article/view/151 https://doi.org/10.34627/rcc.v13i0.151

Sousa N, Almeida A, Coutinho-Rodrigues J, Natividade-Jesus E (2018). Dawn of autonomous vehicles: review and challenges ahead. Municipal Engineer 171(1):3-14. https://doi.org/10.1680/jmuen.16.00063

Sousa N, Coutinho-Rodrigues J, Natividade-Jesus E (2017). Sidewalk Infrastructure Assessment Using a Multicriteria Methodology for Maintenance Planning. Journal of Infrastructure Systems, 23(4). https://doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)IS.1943-555X.0000362

Sousa N, Alçada-Almeida L, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2017). Bi-objective modeling approach for repairing multiple feature infrastructure systems. Computer-Aided Civil and Infrastructure Engineering, 32(3):213-226. https://doi.org/10.1111/mice.12245

Coutinho-Rodrigues J, Sousa N, Natividade-Jesus E (2016). Design of evacuation plans for densely urbanised city centres. Municipal Engineer, 169(3):160-172. (James Hill Prize 2017) https://doi.org/10.1680/jmuen.15.00005

Tralhao L, Sousa N, Ribeiro N, Coutinho-Rodrigues J (2015). Design of bicycling suitability maps for hilly cities. Municipal Engineer, 168(2):96-105. https://doi.org/10.1680/muen.14.00009

Costa MS, Herdeiro CAR, Penedondes J, Sousa N (2005). Hagedorn transition and chronology protection in string theory, Nuclear Physics B, 728(1):148-178. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nuclphysb.2005.08.022

Sousa N, Schellekens A (2003). Orientation matters for NIM-reps, Nuclear Physics B, 653(3):339-368. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0550-3213(02)01124-0

Schellekens A, Sousa N (2001). Open descendants of U(2N) orbifolds at rational radii, International Journal of Modern Physics A, 16(22):3659-3671. https://doi.org/10.1142/S0217751X01005158

Huiszoon L, Schellekens A, Sousa N (2000). Open descendants of non-diagonal invariants, Nuclear Physics B, 575(1):401-415. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0550-3213(00)00090-0

Huiszoon L, Schellekens A, Sousa N (1999). Klein bottles and simple currents, Physics Letters B, 470(1):95-102. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0370-2693(99)01241-1

Projects:

Alternative Fuel Vehicles
Budget: 10000 €
Duration: 2018 - 2019
Project IDs: UI0308 2015-17

Multistep Repair
Duration: 2016 - 2018
Project IDs: UI0308 2015-1

(to be completed)

Thesis Supervision:

Install, Monitor and Multi-Otimization 
Post-doc corporate research project (INESC-Coimbra and ISA), Marisa Cristina Marquês Neto de Matos Resende, 2017.

Form and Function - Benchmarking Real and Ideal Cities
PhD in Territorial Planning, University of Coimbra, João Monteiro, 2024.

An aggregated active accessibility indicator for hilly cities
Energy for Sustainability PhD Program, University of Coimbra. Filipe Pais (in final stage of the research)

Multicriteria methodology for estimating consumer acceptance of alternative powertrain technologies: na expanded overview
Energy for Sustainability MSc Program, University of Coimbra. Luiz Felipe Magalhães Antunes de Almeida, 2020.

Estudo de modelos para previsão da produção da energia eólica na Ilha de São Vicente, Cabo Verde
MSc in Statistics, Mathematics and Computation, Universidade Aberta. Fidel Jesus Gomes, 2019.

Multicriteria Evaluation of the Cyclability of an Urban Road Network
Avaliação Multicritério da Ciclabilidade de uma Rede Viária Urbana
MSc in Civil Engineering/Urban & Transport Systems, DEC/FCTUC. João Pedro Medina Monteiro, 2018.

Indicators of Cycle Accessibility in Urban Areas: Study in Coimbra
Indicadores de Acessibilidade Ciclável em Zonas Urbanas: Estudo em Coimbra
MSc in Civil Engineering/Urban & Transport Systems, DEC/FCTUC. Rita Alexandra Costa Rêgo, 2018.

Railway Mode of Transport: Multiobjective Analysis of Renewal Interventions
Modo de Transporte Ferroviário: Análise Multiobjectivo de Intervenções de Renovação
MSc in Civil Engineering/Urban & Transport Systems, DEC/FCTUC. Sara Isabel Cruz Antunes de Brito, 2017.

Acessibilidade e Atratividade Turística na Região Centro
MSc in Civil Engineering/Urban & Transport Systems, DEC/FCTUC. Mariana Oliveira Pereira, 2017. 

Mobilidade Sustentável: permeabilidade urbana à bicicleta elétrica e suas vantagens energéticas – Aplicação à cidade de Coimbra
Energy for Sustainability MSc Program, University of Coimbra. Ana Esmeralda Martins Gonçalves, 2016.

Pathways to Sustainable Energy in Transport
Vias para a Sustentabilidade Energética dos Transportes
MSc in Civil Engineering/Urban & Transport Systems, DEC/FCTUC. Cátia Raquel Nunes Morais, 2016.

Methodology for the Evaluation of Urban Pedestrian Infrastructures - Application to the City of Coimbra
Metodologia para Avaliação de Infraestruturas Pedonais Urbanas - Aplicação à Cidade de Coimbra
MSc in Civil Engineering/Urban & Transport Systems, DEC/FCTUC. Filipe J. Matos Costa Pais, 2016.

Determinantes da Mudança para o Modo Velocípede em Lisboa
Degree in Environmental Sciences, Universidade Aberta. André Eduardo Lamarão Pais, 2022.

Energia Nuclear em Portugal: não, obrigado!
Degree in Environmental Sciences, Universidade Aberta. André Filipe Vaz Rodrigues, 2021

Energia Nuclear em Portugal: não, obrigado?
Degree in Environmental Sciences, Universidade Aberta. Maria Eliana Santos Pires, 2021. [Top mark: 20/20.]

BabyCloud - Aplicação móvel para registo e acompanhamento da Grávida durante o período de gestação
Degree in Informatics Engineering, Universidade Aberta. Filipe Miguel Dias Rodrigues, 2018.

Short-term quantitative precipitation forecasting challenge
Degree in Informatics Engineering, Universidade Aberta. Frederico Antão, 2017. 

PhysiSurfer – Navegador de Fórmulas de Física 
Degree in Informatics Engineering, Universidade Aberta. António Ritto Coucelo, 2013.

Formulário para Android
Degree in Informatics Engineering, Universidade Aberta. Alexandre Filipe Marques Abreu, 2012.

Media News About Achievements in Applied Research (a selection):

“Energias” - RTP 2 TV, Sociedade Civil. TV debate about energy sources, 07/feb/2022.

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