Get to know us

Associate Professor
John Mills

Media Innovation Studio, University of Central Lancashire
jmills@uclan.ac.uk

Adjunct Professor
Ana Cecília Bisso Nunes

Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS) ;Member at UBILAB/PUCRS
Former PhD candidate at University of Beira Interior (UBI)
ana.nunes@pucrs.br

Professor
Eduardo Campos Pellanda

Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Leader at UBILAB/PUCRS
eduardo.pellanda@pucrs.br

Backgrounds

Media Innovation Studio, University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), United Kingdom

Since 2012, researchers at UCLan’s Media Innovation Studio have been exploring innovation and news media at hyperlocal, local, regional, national and international levels. Using a range of methods they bridge traditional and action research.

For the last ten years, John Mills has explored the internet of things, wearables, media labs and their formation, role and function within a range of media contexts. He was involved in the creation of the World Association of News Publishers’ Global Alliance for Media Innovation, which seeks to unite media labs, legacy media, start-ups and academics to enable a community of practice and collaborative work.

Department of Communication and Arts, University of Beira Interior (UBI), Portugal

Founded in 1979, the University of Beira Interior (UBI) is a young public university in Portugal and a member of the UNITA Consortium, which comprises six European mountain universities. Dr. João Canavilhas, an Associate Professor at UBI and a researcher at Labcom.IFP – Communication, Philosophy and Humanities, was part of the original team due to his research relationship with another team member. Ana Cecília B. Nunes was UBI’s PhD student by the time of the call, based in Portugal, with a thesis on media labs and journalism innovation, and Dr. João was one of her advisors.

By now, Dr. Ana Cecília B. Nunes has been researching experimental innovation units and journalist innovation for more than 7 years, with a Brazilian honourable mention for her work on this topic. In this project, she had a double role, representing both UBI (Portugal) and PUCRS (Brazil), as her PhD was a joint degree between both institutions.

UBILAB – Research Laboratory in Mobility and Media Convergence, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Brazil

Founded in 2011, Ubilab is a lab that explores the connections between technologies and people in communication on the move and their different screens and views. The context of media ubiquity makes it possible to understand not only how always-on communication impacts today’s society, but also new forms of immersion in augmented reality and virtual reality provide new experiences of human/environment interaction.

Dr. Eduardo Pellanda founded the lab with the goal to bridge scientific research and practical knowledge around media and has a proven record of academic and industry cooperation in southern Brazil. Dr. Ana Cecília B. Nunes is also a associated researcher of the lab, being involved with its investigations since the beginning. Her work on media labs and journalism innovation was built upon strong connections with European institutions (UBI and WAN-IFRA).