The several lives of
Gaspar

Life and Vision

The several lives of Gaspar: a biographical contribution. 1940-2019

Gaspar shaped his life in a peculiar way. It was made of cycles, almost a succession of different lives. Each of them was lived intensely, with great energy, enthusiasm and focus. He had a vision to foster progress, to have impact in society, to change the world, here and now.

Each time, he arrived as the outsider, and soon he made a great impact, and generated outstanding added value; this was the result of his competence, intelligence and vision; of his capability to transmit his enthusiasm, to aggregate people and take them with him. And his wide vision always made him choose grand objectives, difficult paths: let’s build something that doesn’t exist at all in the country; let’s to something that was never done before. He was not afraid of dreaming, of the obstacles, of the world.

Gaspar had more enthusiasm than patience. Much of the long-term impact of each of his life cycles depended on people who took over one of the paths and built more solid, long-lasting constructions. But they still remember that Gaspar made it possible in the first place, by showing the new direction and starting to clear the way.

Continuar a ler


— Ciclos de vida —

  1. 1. Youth and political struggle
  2. 2. The 1970s and 1980s
  3. 3. Creation of LIP
  4. 4. The LHC adventure
  5. 5. Distributed Computing
  6. 6. Societal Impact
  7. 7. Proton Teraphy
  • play_circle_filled


Youth and political struggle

Gaspar Pereira de Morais Barreira was born in Braga, in the north of Portugal, on May, 4 1940. He lived until after the revolution of April, 25, 1974 under the name of Gaspar Ferreira, as a result of the law that required children to be registered with the name of the mother's husband, even if the couple lived separately. Illegitimate child, he was affiliated in a will by his biological father, with whom he grew up, and with whom he had a close relationship. Within the family he received, in his words, a “liberal education". His father, Félix de Morais Barreira, belonged to the public administration. He ended his career early, in 1945, as general secretary of the civil government of Funchal, for having refused to comply with Salazar's order to raise the flag in mourning for Hitler's death. This episode marked his son Gaspar "for life”.

In the academic year of 1957/58, he came to Lisbon to study engineering at Instituto Superior Técnico, and soon he got involved in political militancy. The first year was spent in the aftermath of the great student struggle of the previous year, against the so-called "decree 4900", which curtailed the rights of student associations. Young Gaspar joined from the first moment the candidacy of General Humberto Delgado for the presidency of the republic, in the 1958 elections. Recalling these times, Domingos Abrantes says: "He was a young man who lived badly with absolute ideas, always attentive to the opinions of others, and averse to sectarianism. He got along well with young communists and with them he realized what fascism was, and that it was something to take seriously." He became a member of the Portuguese Communist Party in 1959, developing activity in the intellectual sectors. He went underground, as an employee of PCP, in the second half of 1963. This was a radical and difficult cut with the way of living until then. He was assigned to a course in Czechoslovakia, and then in the USSR. He left Portugal shortly after his son was born, and was abroad for 15 months.

On May 14, 1966, he was arrested by PIDE, the political police, in the street, near the Lisbon harbour. He was returning home after a meeting at the home of a shipbuilding worker. Only after the revolution was it possible to explain his arrest: the worker in whose house the meeting had taken place, "the famous Roque was a PIDE informer, one nobody knew about, who were the dangerous ones," he said. On the same day, in the assault to the clandestine house, his partner Isabel Moita, and their son: João, 21 months old, were arrested. He stayed for several weeks at the headquarters of the political police, at rua António Maria Cardoso, in Lisbon. He was violently beaten, tortured and blackmailed using his partner and son. "He was without sleep for 11 days and 11 nights, in May, and again later, in June. The severe conditions of detention caused his partner Isabel to injure herself, swallowing pieces of a spoon. On June 26, he requested the visit of his father, Dr. Félix de Morais Barreira, (…) a request quickly rejected by PIDE", says Alfredo Caldeira. He was then transferred to the prison of Caxias, where he was in isolation for a few months, on the top floor of the northern stronghold. He then moved to another floor, and finally to the southern stronghold, but he remained almost always alone. Gaspar and Isabel got married in the prison of Caxias, thus seeing conjugal rights recognized (although, of course, remaining in separate cells)

Testimonials

He went to trial in late January 1967, and he denounced in court the violence to which he had been subjected. He was sentenced to "three and a half years in prison, loss of political rights for 15 years, and security measures from six months to three years, extendable." The "security measures", which allowed political prisoners to be kept in prison after the duration of their sentence in a discretionary manner, were of almost two years in Gaspar’s case. He spent his time in prison at the fort of Peniche, known for its brutal prison regime. He had several stays in the prisonhospital in Caxias due to the deterioration of his health.

For Gaspar, prison was the university, as he dedicated himself intensively to the study of physics: "Practically everything I studied, I studied in prison. I studied daily, 10 to 12 hours a day, for more than five years”. Domingos Abrantes, a fellow prisoner, says: "In Peniche (...) we spent four years in cells side by side. He was always a supportive person. He studied hard. He had plenty of time, as he was subject to 20 hours of isolation per day. He undoubtedly dreamed of returning to science. Despite the uncertainty about the day of his release, he always continued to study with great enthusiasm, and to teach, one of his important occupations in jail.” His crown of glory was "to have encouraged a companion, an agriculture worker from Couço who was almost illiterate, and who he thought had a talent for mathematics. Once he was release, he continued to study, graduated in Mathematics and became a teacher." Gaspar left the prison-hospital of Caxias, on probation with numerous restrictions, in the Summer of 1971.


“I was mainly a resistant, and a fighter for freedom.”
“Virtually everything I studied, I studied in prison” G. Barreira

“The Revolution of April 25, 1974 gave him the chance to recover his real name and put his talents as a scientist at the service of his country. On any of the fronts, he has always believed in the need and in the possibility of building a better world.” D. Abrantes (Member of PCP and State Councilor)

“We met again at the prison of Caxias, but this time, what a difference, we were free and the political police officers, almost all of them, were under arrest.” A. Caldeira (friend and colleague at Comissão de Extinção da PIDE)

“To speak of Gaspar is to speak of an exceptional human being, simple and modest, a brilliant mind, a humanist of enormous sensitivity and ethical rigor, a scientist of great intelligence and practical sense, lucid, cultured, with a broad view of the world and the society.” M. Guerreiro (Admiral of the Portuguese navy)

“Gaspar was born and lived his youth at number 60 of Estrada de São Martinho. It was a large house, about 1 km from one of the main squares in the city, Campo da Vinha. Despite being very close to the urban center, in the 1940s, the house had a totally rural setting, with a privileged view from its turret over the Quinta do Cávado estates in Real and Dume. (…) On a 1500 m path, (…) he arrived at Liceu Sá de Miranda, where he had his first immersions in the world of physics. (…) Probably, from Sá de Miranda, he would descend to the city center, down Rua dos Chãos, passing in front of Arcada (…) and entering Brasileira, where his father (…), at the table in the main room next to the stairs going up, liked to listen to hunters and fishermen.” A. Cunha (former rector of UM)

“My father was a very strong model for me (...) My parents gave me the tools to think for myself and to be a good human, to be in this life thinking of others and not just thinking of myself, to truly cherish the values of human life and human dignity.” J. Barreira


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The 1970s and 1980s

Released from prison on probation in 1971, already in “Primavera Marcelista” (a time of supposed opening of the dictatorial regime), Gaspar Barreira is denied admission to the Nuclear Energy Institute, and as an experimenter at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon (FCUL). PIDE-DGS claimed: “does not offer guarantees of cooperating in the realization of the higher goals of the State." In other cases, his application papers were simply “lost”. In spite of all difficulties, in 1972 Gaspar Barreira managed to join the Experimental Physics Group of FCUL, led by Gomes Ferreira, integrating the Nuclear Physics Team of Fernando Bragança Gil. "Bragança Gil was very supportive, he was the first person who welcomed him into science”, says Amélia Maio, colleague and friend, who recalls hearing about Gaspar for the first time when a petition launched by Isabel Moita and asking for his release arrived at FCUL. Gaspar had already served the time he was sentenced to and was still in prison under the "security measures".

Just after the revolution, when the situation was politically "hotter", Gaspar "disappeared for a while" from the laboratory. “He always had this tendency to disappear: he was there, then he suddenly disappeared completely and was going to do other things, and after a while he came back and everything continued as if nothing had happened," says Conceição Abreu. As during the rest of his life, civic intervention coexisted with dedication to science. He was part of the Coordination Committee for the Extinction of PIDE-DGS and the Portuguese Legion, together with Alfredo Caldeira, who says: "We were few who (...) managed to overcome our personal creeds and group flags and thought and acted in conformity with broader objectives. Gaspar was certainly one of them", and adds: "It was not easy to dive into that universe that had overshadowed us, and often our families, for all our lives, but we knew with absolute certainty that there (... ) we fulfilled a duty of citizenship, trying to prevent the hydra from subsisting and ruining the future”. Gaspar joined the office of Admiral Martins Guerreiro in the Revolution Council. About this period, Martins Guerreiro recalls: "My office of adviser to the Revolution Council, with only three elements, presented more work and proposals, even in the military area, than the offices of military chiefs who had countless collaborators. This was to a large extent due to Gaspar's work, knowledge, analysis and synthesis capabilities, in addition to his practical and objective sense." It was in this role that, on a trip to Italy in the Summer of 1975, Gaspar met Giana Lanfranchi, who would become his wife.

In 1976 the Nuclear Physics Team of the Experimental Physics Group became the Nuclear Physics Center of the University of Lisbon (CFNUL). In the early hours of March 18, 1978, the Faculty of Sciences, at the time located in rua da Escola Politécnica, in the building where now is the Museum of Natural History and Science, was hit by a major fire, described in the press as a "scientific and university catastrophe”. CFNUL was transferred to the building of Institute of Physics and Mathematics (IFM), where today are the premises of LIP in Lisbon. During this period, leading the CFNUL Group of Electronics and Nuclear Instrumentation, Gaspar was committed to the development of systems for material analysis using X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (XRF), particle-induced X-ray emission (PIXE) and Mossbauer spectroscopy. The list of publications produced using these techniques in different contexts is extensive, and can be found on the slides (opposite) presented in the tribute session to Gaspar Barreira by Filomena Guerra, who arrived at CFNUL as a student in 1980 and shared the office with Gaspar.

His great interest for History, shared with Bragança Gil, led them to pioneer in Portugal applications to archeology. A collaboration agreement was signed between CFNUL and the Centre of History of the University of Lisbon, and the work paid off. “I got to know Gaspar professionally, because, together with Professor Bragança Gil, he was developing research in the area of archeometallurgy, carrying out analyzes of pre and porto-historic metallic artifacts”, Says Ana Margarida Arruda, friend and researcher at the Archeology Center of the University of Lisbon. “Thus, my first paper published in a scientific journal, dated 1980, was signed in collaboration with both of them, and also with Victor Gonçalves, archaeologist, professor of archeology at Faculdade de Letras, and also my husband”. Over the following years, there are many stories on how Gaspar "saved" his colleagues with his ability to make things work, repairing equipment or assembling modules that did not exist. Ana Noronha says she owes him a multichannel analyzer that she needed for her research work. Amélia Maio, a fast pulse generator (nanoseconds) that Gaspar built in collaboration with Sousa Lopes.

Testimonials

Gaspar always wanted to talk about science to non-scientists, and to put science at the service of the country's development. During the 1st National Physics Meeting, organized by the Portuguese Physics Society (SPF) in 1978, the SPF magazine “Gazeta de Física” published the X-ray analysis carried out at CFNUL of the commemorative medal, in which there was an astrolabe and an X-ray tube. In 1979, Gaspar developed a muon detection system for CFNUL's participation in the first edition of ENDIEL, the national meeting for the development of the electric and electronic sectors. ENDIEL was organized (every two years from 1979 to 2015) by ANIMEE, the Portuguese Association of the Companies in the Electric and Electronic Sectors, which would become one of the associates of LIP. In 1980, returning from her doctorate in Belgium, Amélia Maio started to plan an experiment to measure the mass of the neutrino "using techniques of atomic and nuclear physics, and also the Mossbauer effect". She had great support from Vilela Mendes, and also technical support and great enthusiasm from Gaspar. At the time, there were particle physics activities organized between FCUL (namely with Augusto Barroso) and IST (with José Mariano Gago), where people met. Amélia was invited to present the project, which interested the young group of particle physics (who would gather at LIP). "Gaspar spoke more than I did," she says, "all his friends know that this is what happened when he was enthusiastic about something".

Around that time, Augusto Barroso had the initiative to propose Gaspar as an invited auxiliary professor at FCUL. With the help of some colleagues at CFNUL, namely Amélia Maio and Conceição Abreu, the signatures of all the full professors in all departments of FCUL were collected. Only Sousa Lopes, from the area of instrumentation and electronics, did not sign. The request was accepted, but Gaspar refused the position. In those early 1980s the path took Gaspar Barreira to the International Center for Theoretical Physics (ICTP), in Trieste. ICTP had a cooperation agreement with CFNUL. "At that time, we were still a developing country," explains Amélia Maio. Gaspar Barreira started by going to a school at ICTP, where he must have been noticed. And collaboration began. Within a short time, he became director of the Microprocessor Laboratory and organizer of the "ICTP-CERN Series of Colleges on Microprocessors", in which he also taught, and which made him travel the world: Trieste (1981 and 1983), Colombo, Sri-Lanka ( 1984), Bogotá and Lisbon (1985), Hefei, China (1986). In 1985 colleagues at CFNUL recall the arrival in Lisbon of a large amount of equipment from Trieste and Geneva: terminals, electronics boards, cables, tools. Gaspar could have stayed in Trieste, pursuing a rapidly rising career. But there are challenges that he would never say no to.


“Gaspar had many dreams, and many of them came true. But Gaspar also believed in other people’s dreams, and struggled to make them true.”
Filomena Guerra

“As all friends of Gaspar know, his interests were many and varied. And his immense and diverse culture, also humanistic, allowed for long conversations, on multiple themes (the horses that top the Basilica of San Marco in Venice, ginkgo bilobas, French wine varieties, the mushrooms of Serra de Grândola, breeds of canids and their “Talpa”, Neapolitan cakes, ...), almost always in front of a glass of red wine and some snack, at our home, in Lisbon, or theirs, then in Paço de Arcos, always accompanied by Victor and Gianna. (…) Gaspar was a good man, whole and straight. Generous, brilliant and cultured. It was a privilege to enjoy his company and to have counted on his friendship.” A.M. Arruda

"In the morning of April 25, 1974, although we were told to stay home, I decided to take my usual walk to the faculty. If they stopped me, I would say I didn't know anything and I was on my way to work. I lived in Estrela and I went down to S. Bento [near the parliament] but was disappointed because there was no one there. Then I went up to Rua da Escola Politécnica. When I arrived, there were only Bragança Gil and Gaspar, who had taken a small radio. When the events at Largo do Carmo started, Gaspar went there. After the revolution, when things started to get hotter politically, Gaspar disappeared for a while."

A. Maio

“(…) Due to his intelligence, ingenuity and culture, we lived good and inspired moments. Professor Bragança Gil, a fearless man, welcomed Gaspar into the group in 1972 where (…) he did everything from electronics to physics (...). When he solved the problems, he always gave an unexpected and innovative contribution to the solution.” C. Abreu

“I met him for the first time in 1984 at ICTP in Trieste, during the microprocessor school where we both were teachers. The course was replicated many times all over the world. Our friendship grew beautifully and I had many other occasions to work with him in other projects and to enjoy his warm hospitality, in Lisbon and in Algarve together with Gianna and Talpa.”

F. Ragusa (University of Milano)


Testemunho

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The creation of LIP

In 1985/1986, Gaspar Barreira spent part of his time at the ICTP in Trieste, while remaining active at CFNUL. During the process of Portugal’s accession to CERN, he was challenged to return and found LIP, with José Mariano Gago and Armando Policarpo, building the instrumentation division of the laboratory. LIP would unite the small experimental particle physics community, boosting the participation at CERN and the exploitation of the enormous opportunities that arose from it. Those who were in Portugal and those who were about to return, those who had been in the West Area or the North Area of CERN, the young Portuguese experimental particle physicists gathered at LIP. NA38 was the first experiment in which Portugal participated as a member country, through an institute that also appeared for the first time, LIP. “The NA38 project seemed ideal to be the first experiment at CERN with the official participation of Portugal. And it really was”, says João Varela, who, in 1984, had finished his PhD thesis on Drell-Yan production at the NA10 muon spectrometer. The first NA38 publication signed by LIP as an institution appeared in 1988 (see links, opposite).

At that time, Gaspar Barreira developed and implemented for NA38 the electronic board FARCE, the first developed by LIP. Paulo Gomes, then a young electronics and instrumentation student supervised by Gaspar, tells us about the “unforgettable Summer of 1986” that they spent “in the electronics laboratory that Gaspar had created at ICTP, near Trieste, in total immersion: working, eating and sleeping there. The electronics board we developed and implemented, the first made at LIP, was called FARCE (Fast Acquisition and Crate Encoder), but it worked very well in NA38. Next, we participated in the development of the first optical link for DELPHI and ALEPH (1987-89).” The participation in the DELPHI experiment at LEP, CERN's big accelerator of the 1990s, was an extremely important step for the growth of LIP, and a step in which Gaspar played a decisive role. The other important contribution in the construction phase were the LTDs, large fastbus cards designed at CERN, produced by Portuguese industry (EFACEC) and tested at LIP. It was this project that triggered the advanced training program for young engineers at CERN, which, thanks to Gaspar Barreira, remains active and is today an example of success.

From electronics, Gaspar's interests extended into computing, initially related to data acquisition systems and microprocessor programming. Since the early years, Gaspar has devoted considerable efforts to increasing the computing resources. He bought LIP’s first MicroVAX machine. Acquired via CERN, it arrived in December 1986, with the following specifications: “MicroVAX II Q2: 5MB RAM, 71MB disk, tape drive for 94MB cartridges, 0.9 VPU and Fortran compiler”. Less than two years later, there was already a small local VAX cluster, an (expensive and slow) connection to the outside that allowed sending emails and remote login at CERN, as well as LIP’s first UNIX machine. The first CERN Computing School in Portugal was held in 1988, in Madeira, when the LIP computing group was taking its first steps. LIP was integrated in the National Scientific Computing Network (RCCN, 1Mb/s throughput) in 1988, and Gaspar joined the Users’ Council of the Foundation for National Scientific Computing (FCCN). He would become a member of the FCCN Executive Committee for more than a decade at the beginning of the 21st century.




But the creation of LIP was not something that happened in a single moment in time, but rather a process that has been going on for the past 34 years. And Gaspar's intervention was not limited to the laboratory's instrumentation and computing division. From the beginning, his audacity and his broad vision, which largely shaped the laboratory, stood out. José Mariano Gago's transition to active politics, first as president of JNICT and later in successive terms as minister of science, kept him, for long periods, away from LIP, where he always returned, intermittently. In a natural way, Gaspar took the lead, and he was the constant presence that, in three decades of growth, advances and setbacks, changes, opportunities and choices, has done a lot for the creation of the laboratory we know today. He made it a reference laboratory in particle and astroparticle physics, instrumentation, technology and computing. With nodes in Lisboa, Coimbra and Braga. And this wideness, this openness both geographically and in areas of activity, is a hallmark of Gaspar's vision.

And it was like that throughout the life of the laboratory: Gaspar played a fundamental role in the development of instrumentation and computing at LIP; but also in Portugal joining the DELPHI experiment at LEP; and in the participation in the LHC, from the very beginning, in the first half of the 1990s; and in the big investment in distributed computing, a paradigm shift required by the huge volume of data of the new accelerator’s experiments; he also played an important role in opening up to the area of astroparticle physics, which started with AMS in the late 1990s, and in which he was personally involved; and also in the creation of the LIP node in Braga, which recently celebrated a decade of existence. Gaspar always tried to open the laboratory to society, recognizing the importance of technology and knowledge transfer, collaboration with industry, advanced training, innovation, scientific dissemination and outreach. We will talk about all this a little later. Much of what LIP is today is due to Gaspar, who has dedicated to the laboratory much of his immense energy over these more than three decades, and whose vision has really shaped LIP.


“I had the chance to participate in the first workshops Gaspar organized on microprocessors (1985) and fast electronics (1987) for Particle Physics setting the basis for LIP’s branch on electronics and instrumentation. He was my supervisor for 10 years, since the end of my Degree (85) until completing the PhD (95). He always trusted and supported my work, and was a source of great inspiration for me.” Paulo Gomes


“Since the early days [of LIP], Gaspar has always fought for more computing capacity, more network capacity, more data capacity, so that we can do science here [in Portugal]” J. Gomes (responsible for the LIP Computing Group)


"If today we have a LIP that is not just a group of physicists participating in experiments at CERN, but rather a diverse but coherent community of physicists, engineers, technicians, administrative and students, engaged in the challenges of particle physics but also of instrumentation, computing and technology, deeply embedded in international and national collaborations, we owe much of it to Gaspar." Mário Pimenta (President of LIP)


“ He was a confounder of LIP which was established originally to strengthen the relations between Portugal and CERN. But also thanks to the vision of Gaspar LIP became an essential element in modernising Portuguese education, science and technology. Gaspar never tried to be in the limelight but devoted his forces with patience and modesty to achieve the common goals. When Mariano Gago became minister Gaspar was without hesitation ready to step in and to continue the visionary work started by Gago. Gaspar was a great believer in the value of international cooperation and in spite of serious health problems he accomplished skilfully the tasks of Portuguese delegate to the CERN and the SESAME Council. Because of his immaculate character and abundant human warmth I consider it as a great privilege and enrichment to have been able to meet and work with Gaspar ” H. Schopper (Former DG of CERN)


“I will never forget his contagious enthusiasm, vision, generosity and wisdom, which I have enjoyed and appreciated since the times of the DELPHI collaboration at CERN, thirty years ago. He has left an enduring track in all those who worked with him. I'll always remember Gasper and what he has done for physics and society” U. Amaldi (professor at University of Milan)


“One of the bonuses of getting the LIP team involved in the Pierre Auger Observatory was that I met and came to know and greatly admire Gaspar Barreira. We met many times and I enjoyed hospitality in his home on several occasions. Gaspar was a man of deep humility, endowed with a fund of common sense coupled to great vision and ambition for science in Portugal and Europe, who saw the pursuit of science as a way of improving life for everyone.” A. Watson (Co-founder of the Pierre Auger Observatory)


“Gaspar was a good friend, and I'll miss him. I'll miss all our discussions about Italian politics, Portuguese politics, politics in general; our discussions about particle physics, astroparticle physics, applied physics, physics in general. I'll miss our dinners in Vale da Pedra, in Ereira and in Lisboa, and our discussions about food and wine. The scientific community, Portugal, and myself, we are loosing a lot.” Alessandro de Angelis



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The LHC adventure

Gaspar Barreira was a staunch supporter of CERN, international cooperation and long-term scientific infrastructures. He supported the LHC from the very beginning, in the first half of the 1990s, and has been a member of CERN's LHC Resources Review Board since the first meeting. He played a decisive role in strengthening the participation of Portuguese companies and research groups in the LHC. About how it all started, nothing better than the words of Gaspar himself, in a brief conversation for the LIP Bulletin when ATLAS and CMS celebrated 25 years, in 2017. He called it: “The day I first heard about the LHC (before it was called the LHC)”:

“It all happened in the morning of October 17, 1984. I was in Trieste, and my mission was to put together the microprocessors laboratory at ICTP. I was building FARCE, an interface for the NA38 at CERN, the experiment in which were involved several of the people that would found LIP a couple of years later. I had a breakfast appointment with Luciano Bertocchi, the vice-director of ICTP — in fact, the deputy of Abdus Salam, who had founded the institute. He was not around when I got there, and I asked the concierge whether he had already been seen in that morning. “Professor Bertocchi is in his office,” he said, “he asks that you go and see him quickly, as soon as you arrive”. On the lift, I noticed the announcement of a seminar by Carlo Rubia in that same day. I found it odd, as seminars were usually announced well in advance. When I got to Bertocchi’s office, while asking me not to say a word around, and claiming that it was going to be “a great event”, he told me the Noble Prize to Carlo Rubia was about to be announced. He was traveling to his home town, very nearby, and on the way he would give a seminar in Trieste. Everything was planned for the announcement to happen during the seminar. But the fog in Milano spoiled it all: the plane was late, and when he arrived the prize was already public. And there was a crowd, the televisions and everything.

At the seminar, Rubia told the audience (which included Salam, to whom he called “old chap”) that just the day before he was in a helicopter overflying the Texas desert, where they were building the next large proton collider, the SSC — Superconducting Super Collider. He said a sentence that I never forgot: “If Europe does not find an alternative, it is out of the race for the next 100 years”. The SSC was a 90 km ring, with an energy of 20+20 TeV. I had several friends within the team who already had contracts to work for the SSC. But it so happened that there was a great conflict with the US Congress and the SSC was cancelled in 1993, when the excavation works were already quite advanced.

Testimonials

Meanwhile, Portugal became a member of CERN and LIP was created in 1986. In 1989, LEP started operations. In the same year, Carlo Rubia became Director General (DG) of CERN. And he was still DG when the SSC was cancelled. He then pushed for the LHC project. It was more modest than the SSC, so that it was possible to build it in the Geneva area at that time. As a curiosity, it is worth noting that it was Rubia who, also in 1993, took the decision of making public the web protocol, invented at CERN. The following DG was Chris Llewellyn Smith, who consolidated the project. The construction took place during the mandates of Maiani (in which there was a budget crisis) and, mostly, Aymar. The start happened with Rolf Heuer. First there was a false start and a serious problem with the welding of the helium system. The second start was a great success, and we had the Higgs boson discovery already in 2012. Still in the first half of the 1990s, the LHC Resources Review Board was created. It followed all the LHC process in the planning, construction and operations phases — in what concerns machine, experiments, and computing. I was there from the first meeting, and this is why I can say I know virtually every screw in the LHC.

As for Portugal, in 1992 there was a meeting at the headquarters of the Portuguese Physics Society. The heads of the four experiments then proposed came to Lisbon — there was Michel Della Negra for CMS, and Peter Jenni for the experiment then called EAGLE, which would later be at the origin of ATLAS. The issue was discussed at the LIP workshop in Praia das Maçãs. I fought for us to participate in only one experiment. After all, Portugal joined two experiments. Today, I see that I was wrong.”

In 1990, Gaspar Barreira, Amélia Maio, João Varela and Mário Pimenta participated in the “Aachen LHC workshop”, dedicated to the physics objectives and experimental challenges of a hadron collider. LIP had to be part of the LHC! Although this participation was unquestionable, there was no unanimous view on which experiments to join. Amélia Maio's group had been working with optical fibres and scintillators for a long time, on CERN's SPACAL, RD1 and RD34 projects, initiated with Peter Sonderegger; and was now deeply involved in the development of the TileCal hadron calorimeter for ATLAS. On the other hand, João Varela's group had followed the path of R&D in fast electronics in the RD11, RD12 and RD13 projects; and was now participating in the development of the ECAL electromagnetic calorimeter for CMS (PbWO4 crystals). Serious internal discussions followed, leading to the decision to enter the two major LHC experiments. LIP signed the Letters of Intent of ATLAS and CMS in 1992. Looking back, despite the tension created by the division between the ATLAS and CMS groups, this decision allowed a strong Portuguese participation in the LHC physics program, potentiating the development of the various skills.

The LHC accelerator project and the associated experimental program thus gained momentum in 1992, when the CMS and ATLAS proto-collaborations sent the Letters of Intent of the LHC experiments to CERN’s Scientific Committee (CERN/LHCC 92-003). The Technical Proposals followed in 1994 (CERN/LHCC 94-38). The Portuguese groups in ATLAS and CMS were among the signatories of these initial proposals. The accelerator and experiments were approved in 1995. LIP's ATLAS and CMS groups actively participated in the design of the experiments, described in detail in the “Technical Design Reports” approved in 1998-2000, and in the construction, installation and preparation for operation of the detectors, completed in 2008. In 2009, the LHC collided the first beams, and in 2010-2011 both experiments accumulated a large amount of data. The discovery of the Higgs boson was announced in 2012. The LIP groups are now intensely involved in data analysis and also in preparing the upgrade of the LHC and its detectors.

Gaspar actively sought the participation of Portuguese companies in the opportunities created at the LHC (accelerator and experiments). A. Silva Matos, builder of metal tanks for milk transportation, would build helium tanks for the cooling of the superconducting magnets; Chipidea was involved in the development and production of electronics for the CMS ECAL; a prototype of the CMS positioning reference structures (MAB) was developed and tested at INEGI, Porto; Instituto de Soldadura e Qualidade (ISQ) was involved in welding techniques. On the ATLAS side, the immense work with optical fibres included the characterization of the fibres for the TileCal readout and the necessary developments for the manufacture of fibre bundles in Portugal: aluminization was carried out in collaboration with Manuel Maneira, at FCT-UNL, and a robot for assembling the fibre bundles was developed and built at the LIP workshop in Coimbra, where the assembly took place between 2001 and 2003, in a major industrial operation. Other companies would become CERN's industrial partners in the LHC project: EFACEC, Irmãos Bernardes SA (plastic profiles for TileCal), 3DTech (fibre optical connectors and plastic parts), HFA (TileCal electronics), Cabelte (upgrade of TileCal high voltage), PETsys Electronics (ECAL electronics upgrade). Gaspar Barreira was a member of the LHC-RRB (the committee with representatives from all countries participating in the LHC experiments, with the aim of monitoring their financial needs) from the beginning and for twenty years, always honoring Portugal’s financial commitments with ATLAS and CMS.


“From the first moment, I was truly surprised by the enthusiasm and confidence of Gaspar, when talking about a variety of subjects, but in particular about the enormous opportunities that a close collaboration with CERN could bring to Portuguese industry in many different areas.” O. Santos (ISQ)

“Gaspar was one of the key persons, one of the initiators of this effort of Portugal's participation in the LHC, in 1992. He was the one who truly got the project through FCT and then followed the execution of the program” J. Varela

“Gaspar has always supported our participation in the LHC, but with great autonomy. In the concrete choices, he did not intervene or impose anything, but supported the decisions” A. Maio

“He was such an extraordinary man, honest, critical, but always constructive. CERN and ATLAS have lost a true friend. – In my memory many interventions of him come back from the RRB, where his opinion had a weight, and helped the experiment. And also I remember with pleasure a few visits in Lisbon where he was a friendly host to LHC events.” P. Jenni (Former spokesperson of ATLAS)


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Distributed computing

The first proposals on how to obtain computing capacity with geographically and administratively distributed computing resources date from the late 1980s. In view of the huge volume of data that would have to be processed when the LHC experiments came into operation, around the year 2000 CERN decided to adopt this new approach to deal with LHC data: the computing resources would be distributed among the participating countries.

The computing model of the LHC is today Grid computing, which did not exist when the history of the LHC began. Grid is a network and computing technology that integrates hundreds of local computing centers into a single computing infrastructure. The objective is to provide sufficient computing power for “everyone anywhere on the planet”, in a homogeneous and transparent way for the users, allowing the analysis of the huge amount of data produced by the LHC experiments.

Gaspar was a strong supporter of Grid computing, and spared no effort to take Portugal and LIP to the main projects in this area, at CERN and at European level. It all started around the year 2000 with DataGrid, a European project led by CERN. Portugal participated as an unfunded partner. After DataGrid (2001), LIP participated in the European project CrossGrid, already as a funded partner. Thanks to Gaspar's efforts, LIP was a full partner in all the projects that followed, namely EGEE - Enabling Grids for E-SciencE (I, II and III) and INT.EU.GRID (computational middleware and pilot infrastructures for Grid computing); Gaspar was chairman of the European Grid Initiative (EGI) scientific policy committee, and the promoter of IBERGRID, the Iberian network infrastructure that joins Portugal and Spain, reinforcing cooperation between the two countries.

Gaspar Barreira was responsible for the creation in Portugal of a Tier-2 of CERN's Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG). This global LHC computer network was approved by the CERN Council in 2002, and the respective agreement was signed in 2006. Portugal agreed to install a level 2 node (Tier-2). As there was not enough space in LIP’s premises at Av. Elias Garcia, in Lisboa, where a pilot was already running, the Tier-2 was distributed across three locations: LIP-Lisboa, LIP-Coimbra and NCG (at LNEC). Within this programme, LIP set up the largest computer center ever built in Portugal. Gaspar Barreira, then president of LIP, and Jorge Gomes, coordinator of the LIP Computing Group, played a leading role in this adventure. Today, LIP is part of the WLCG project, led by CERN in collaboration with all the main high-energy physics institutes in the world, and operates the Portuguese Tier-2 cluster of the WLCG.

Testimonials

Gaspar often had grand dreams. His audacity in assuming responsibilities bringing to Portugal infrastructures able to generate development and to create opportunities was, at times, challenging for the nerves of those who were on the ground with the responsibility to implement the agreed solutions, meeting all the deadlines and commitments: where are we going to find the rest of the money? And what about the human resources needed to meet such a tight deadline? Gaspar deeply believed in his ambitious projects, and relied on his shrewdness and negotiating power. But, it is fair to say it, he relied also on the unsurpassable technical skills, dedication and sense of responsibility of the LIP computing group, led by Jorge Gomes.

Gaspar Barreira played a central role in the creation, in 2016, of the Portuguese National Distributed Computing Infrastructure, INCD, an association of FCT-FCCN, LIP and LNEC, and was the first president of the association's General Assembly. Operated by LIP, INCD currently provides high throughput computing, high performance computing, Cloud computing and data services to the entire Portuguese scientific community. Currently, the infrastructure has sites in Lisbon (LNEC) and Minho (REN's datacenter).

Today, LIP participates in the EOSC-hub project that brings together EGI, EUDAT and INDIGO, and which materializes the European Commission's vision for the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC). LIP, through INCD, participates in IBERGRID, which brings together scientific computing centers in Portugal and Spain, and which allows the two countries to participate jointly in EGI and EOSC. EGI is a federated digital infrastructure whose mission is to provide advanced computing services for scientific research and innovation. Scientists using these services work for international organizations, research infrastructures, universities or simply as individual researchers. These have in common the use of computing services for the treatment and sharing of research data in the scientific community.


“I do not have to tell you that Gaspar, a man of principles that suffered for them, he was also the key promoter of Iberian cooperation in HEP and computation (…) we now have the responsibility to keep alive his legacy!” Carlos Alejaldre (Director General, CIEMAT)

“The work with him was always very pleasant, as he was a nice person but also constructive and able to compromise” M. Turala ()

“My first conversation with Gaspar was a colossal fight, (...) about computing. It was easy to get into some discussion with Gaspar about computing. I immediately started to appreciate him (...) He was one of the few people who referred to success with 'us' and to failure with 'me'. You don’t find so very many, it's usually the other way around. That was something that immediately made me like him” Sergio Bertolucci (University of Pisa, former Director of Research and Scientific Computing at CERN)

“As Gaspar used to say, this is not a speed run, this is a marathon, so we have to keep running” J. Gomes

“Without Gaspar, I would probably not be here giving this presentation, because IBERGRID would simply not exist” I. Campos

“I think we can all agree that Gaspar was a visionary: (…) He was also a visionary in the importance he gave to collaboration, and that was one of the most important aspects for me.” J. Marco

“He was indeed an extraordinary person and it was a privilege to have the opportunity to meet (…) The contributions he gave to open new opportunities, and above all the example, marked many people and left a positive trail of unusual value” L. Magalhães


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Impact on society

Gaspar Barreira was a staunch supporter of CERN, of international cooperation and of promoting the impact of science in society, at all levels. From the turn of the century, he became deeply involved in science policy and scientific management, always looking for the best opportunities for science, for society and for Portugal. He was the representative of Portugal in a variety of scientific organizations and international science and scientific policy committees, and coordinated several international programs for scientific and technological cooperation. Gaspar was the Portuguese Delegate to the CERN Council from 2006 to the Autumn of 2018, and his voice was among the most respected by many members of the Council. In what concerns cooperation agreements between Portugal and Spain, Gaspar Barreira managed to renew the computing contract even before the agreement for particle physics had the final approval from the Spanish side. Gaspar accepted all missions in which he was convinced that he could make a difference. For example, he played an important role in connecting Brazil to CERN, and was present at the signature of the MoU on Brazilian activities at CERN, in September 2009, after decades of collaboration of Brazilian physicists at CERN.

Since the beginning, he has truly contributed to bring Portugal into CERN: research groups, but also industry, engineers, teachers and students. In this and other contexts, he always had a special concern with the transfer of knowledge to society. He co-coordinated the advanced training programs for young Portuguese engineers at CERN, ESA and ESO, and played an important role in the creation of the Portuguese Language Teachers Program at CERN.

Gaspar Barreira was the Portuguese representative at ECFA (European Committee for Future Accelerators) for over 20 years (1996-2017). As a member of ECFA, he was part of the European Strategy Group (ESG), which proposed the European Strategy for Particle Physics issued in 2013, and currently under review. He was the Portuguese delegate (with Lígia Amâncio) to the committee that proposed the revision of the 2008 European Strategy Forum For Research Infrastructures (ESFRI). He was the Portuguese Delegate to the SESAME Council, where Portugal is an observer country, having replaced José Mariano Gago. In recent years, his vision for science in Europe made him a key contributor to FCT and MCTES, with influence in the definition of national and European policies.

“It is easy to see what Gaspar did for Portugal, and for Portugal at CERN. It is perhaps less obvious what Gaspar did for CERN and the rest of Europe”, says Sergio Bertolucci, who also gives us his answer: "Gaspar always believed that science is one of the few languages of peace that humanity invented, and that CERN is the demonstration of that. He has been one of the really relevant people in the CERN Council for at least 15 years. He was someone who gave continuity to the Council, understood the dynamics of politics, and had a vision (...) In 2006, he was one of the people who, looking at the CERN Treaty, understood that the Council should be concerned not only with the laboratory in Geneva, but with the organization of this scientific area in all Europe. This gave rise to the first European strategy for particle physics. It was no accident that the final meeting for its approval took place in Lisbon. (...) Another aspect in which he was fundamental in the interpretation of the Treaty was when he understood that the Council should move forward in the enlargement, both geographic and scientific, which are fundamental for the central message that CERN represents”.

Gaspar Barreira has always been an enthusiast of scientific culture for everyone. He was at the basis of training programs in cooperation with CERN, he was one of the founders of Ciência Viva, he was president of the Young Scientists contest. In the words of Rosalia Vargas, President of Agência Ciência Viva, he had an “infinite passion for spreading knowledge, and he wanted to do it everywhere”. Gaspar was someone who “looked at science with a sense and a purpose: to free people from tyranny. For him, the fight for democracy was deeply linked to the fight against obscurantism and ignorance (…) Freedom would never be complete without scientific culture, without science for all.”

Testimonials

6. Cooperação internacional, política científica e impacto na sociedade

Just over a decade ago, Gaspar contributed to the creation of a LIP node at the University of Minho (UM), at his hometown Braga, and signed the collaboration agreement between LIP and UM with the then rector António Cunha. The LIP node in Minho has grown from the minimal initial team (1 professor + 1 postdoc) to approximately 30 people today. António Cunha tells us the story: “At the end of the first decade of this century, António Onofre joined the UM and created a group of particle physics. Supported by Gaspar's energy and determination, this group would give rise to the LIP-Minho node, formalized on February 17, 2010. The respective protocol was signed by Gaspar, on behalf of LIP, and by myself, then recent Rector, in a ceremony in the Day of the University celebration, chaired by Minister Mariano Gago (…) Since then, the node has grown rapidly in number of people and results (…) For all this, for the talent, for the vision, for the help and the friendship, our gratitude and appreciation are huge. Thank you Gaspar! ”


“Gaspar played a unique role in the development of industry in Portugal. The training program for young engineers, which he coordinated over the past decades, was one of his passions ” “Gaspar made a critical contribution to scientific policy (…) The new legal regime for scientific research institutions has a perhaps unprecedented contribution from Gaspar, without ever wanting to appear, without ever wanting his name to be disclosed” Manuel Heitor (Minister of Science, Technology and Higher Education)

“Gaspar was a fundamental partner of CERN, always constructive and supportive (...) he was a unique and special person, a great friend of particle physics and CERN. He was a great scientist, a curious man and a very brilliant mind.” F. Gianotti (DG of CERN)

“Gaspar was outspoken, to the point, but always driven by justice and humanity” R. Heuer (Former DG of CERN)

“Later, already with José Mariano Gago as Minister of Science and Technology, we participated in initiatives that we considered necessary. Obviously, discussing, discussing, discussing. That was our unbreakable friendship.” A. Caldeira (friend and colleague at Comissão de Extinção da PIDE)

“I remember how Gaspar gave enormous importance to the possibility of equal opportunities for all, of access to education, culture, science and technology, and the hope he had in the training of scientists and in the management, ethical and responsible, of the scientific system as a vector for the development of societies and the emancipation of Men”. M. Guerreiro (Admiral of the Portuguese navy)

“SPF is proud of having had Gaspar Barreira as its member. Since the beginning of his professional life in Physics, he has always been a master, committed to helping the younger generations, especially students of physics and physical engineering, to discover new routes in international institutions, among which CERN and ESA stand out”. C. Abreu (President of the Portuguese Physics Society)

“Gaspar Barreira was born in Braga and he was very important for the scientific development of the town and of the region in the last 20 years. In a life of almost 80 years, the first and the last two decades are strongly linked to Braga”. A. Cunha (former rector of UM)

“Gaspar looked at science with a sense and a purpose: to free people from tyranny. For him, the fight for democracy was deeply linked to the fight against obscurantism and ignorance (…) Freedom would never be complete without scientific culture, without science for all.” R. Vargas (President of Ciência Viva)

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Proton Theraphy

Detectors and other tools used in particle physics have a wide range of other applications, namely in health care, some of which are being developed at LIP. The radiotherapy network in Portugal currently includes about 60 LINAC units and 68 brachytherapy units, in public and private health institutions. The inclusion of a proton therapy unit has already been considered in the 2015 review of the national radiotherapy network promoted by the General Health Directorate (DGS). When the Government established as a priority the installation in Portugal of a center for proton therapy of oncological patients, with both treatment and research facilities, Gaspar immediately embraced the idea. This was his last great project and enthusiasm.

In 2017, a working group was created with the objective of defining a strategy for the installation in Portugal of a new health unit for the treatment of patients with cancer using high-energy particle technologies (Diário da República nº 197/2017, October 12). Aspects to be identified and planned were: the target number of treatments; the clinical support needed for operation; the technical and scientific basis for the research activities; the necessary support for R&D activities (with FCT); the development of a national network of research, training and medical assistance infrastructures for the treatment of oncological patients using new technologies; the conditions necessary to stimulate scientific, technical and clinical cooperation at international level; the necessary human and financial resources.

This working group was coordinated by Gaspar Barreira, from LIP, representing the Ministry of Science, Technology and Higher Education, and by João Oliveira, from Instituto Português de Oncologia Francisco Gentil (IPO), representing the Ministry of Health. Also part of the working group were representatives of several health institutions and programs, as well as Arlindo Oliveira, President of Instituto Superior Técnico (IST). It was considered in the mandate that "the installation of this unit would enhance the installed capacity at the Nuclear Technologies Campus in Sacavém, as well as facilitate the development of a new national strategy for the strengthening of medical physics and clinical research in the area of cancer", and that the new unit should have "a strong focus on research and development, namely clinical research, which implies the effective involvement of a wide range of institutions and experts from the sectorial areas involved". The Working Group had the support of an international committee that included representatives from CERN, as well as from international reference scientific institutions and clinical centers that will facilitate cooperation in oncological therapies.

The working group did its job and developed a plan for installing such an infrastructure in Portugal. It was up to this point that Gaspar's health allowed him to go, in a great effort to take the project to a stage at which it could hardly be reverted. In 2018, a resolution of the Council of Ministers (28/2018) established that proton therapy will be available in the national health system, with the initial capacity to treat 700 patients per year. The network should be national, but the first unit will be at the Technological and Nuclear Campus of IST, taking advantage of the available human and technical resources. FCT allocated 10 M€ for the training of doctors and researchers in the period 2018-2023. FCT, IPO and other hospitals and institutions involved in cancer treatment are authorized to create a non-profit association to install and operate the future proton therapy unit.

In December 2019, the association ProtoTera — Portuguese Proton-Therapy and Advanced Technologies for Cancer Prevention and Treatment Association was created. Its founding members are IPO, LIP, IST, and the University of Coimbra (UC). The main involved research centers of IST and UC are, respectively, the Nuclear Technology Center (CTN) and the Institute of Nuclear Sciences Applied to Health (ICNAS), with whom LIP has developed a strategic partnership and important collaborative projects in the last years. The vision is to promote a national network for cancer diagnosis and treatment, research and education, using high-energy particle beam therapies (in particular proton therapy), theranostics, dosimetry and advanced medical imaging techniques, to improve precision and personalized medicine.

Testimonials
7. A Física e a Medicina: terapia com protões

In a first phase, two infrastructures will be installed: one at the CTN campus, with a 230 MeV proton beam; and another at ICNAS, with a 70 MeV proton beam. The Lisbon facility will have two or three treatment rooms and a research room. The Coimbra facility will be specialized in the treatment of eye cancer and in the production of heavy radioisotopes. Close collaborations will be established with international reference centers, namely with CERN, GSI, Heidelberg University Hospital, MD Anderson Cancer and Trento Proton Therapy Center. Quoting Mário Pimenta, president of LIP, "Gaspar's last big dream for Portugal is yet to be fulfilled. We will strive for it!”


“A few months before his departure, aware that he had little time, he spoke of the need for another six to twelve months of life to advance proton cancer therapy, in order to ensure that the project reached a point of no return. Even at that stage he thought about his dreams and projects, he was more concerned with others than with himself. Gaspar was like that. We must bring his last dreams to life” M. Guerreiro (Admiral of the Portuguese navy)

“Gaspar arrived with all his enthusiasm and (...) installing a proton therapy unit in Portugal seemed to depend only on the effort we put into it (...) He was an immense force to advance this idea” J. Oliveira (Director of IPO)

“Proton therapy is both a mature technology and a technology of the future. That’s why we shouldn’t be happy with a turnkey solution” A. Oliveira (President of IST)

“(…) we just have to find the money, which is going to be a little bit more difficult without Gaspar, because he could be really persuasive. But we also learned some tricks with him.” J. Marques (Director of CTN/IST)

“Gaspar was a person always ahead of his time (…) In 2016, before a visit to CERN, Gaspar launched the challenge of discussing the introduction of proton therapy in Portugal (…) Some time later, he was excited to show me the WHO report saying that for every 10 million inhabitants there should be in the future a clinic for such treatments. I hope that soon we will be able to inaugurate Clínica Gaspar Barreira.” Manuel Heitor (Minister of Science, Technology and Higher Education)

“I visited Gaspar shortly before he passed away, together with some friends, and he gave me a very important message: he was absolutely aware of his condition, but he spent his time with us talking about the future” S. Bertolucci (University of Pisa, former Director of Research and Scientific Computing at CERN)

“His last big project and enthusiasm, the installation in Portugal of a treatment and research center for cancer therapy with protons, is not yet accomplished. For this we will strive!” M. Pimenta (President of LIP)

“Gaspar has always dreamed, and many of his dreams have come true. Hopefully his last dream will also come true: a proton accelerator for research in physics, therapy, and research in oncology. This infrastructure is essential for Physics and Medicine in Portugal.” C. Abreu (President of the Portuguese Physics Society)


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