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Research, innovation, and technology development teams from Latin America and the Caribbean are invited to apply for the BELLA II Bioinformatics and Artificial Intelligence (BIO+IA) Testbed Early Adopters Programme, a regional initiative that promotes projects that use artificial intelligence to analyze molecular interaction networks.

The programme offers selected teams free access to specialised technological infrastructure, along with training and technical mentoring, to develop and validate solutions in areas such as gene regulation, molecular signalling, complex diseases, precision medicine, antimicrobial resistance, and biotechnology. Proposals may be submitted until 27 March 2026.

Through this initiative, four to five projects from across the region will be selected, and their teams will work for eight weeks using the BIO+IA Testbed, a regional infrastructure designed to process large volumes of scientific information with advanced artificial intelligence tools. During this process, participants will receive specialised training and technical support to apply these capabilities to their own use cases and develop concrete results that advance research and innovation in the region.

“The call is open to the Latin American community engaged in research, education, and innovation. Participating teams will receive training, mentoring for their research projects, and access to the BELLA II testbed itself,” explained Julián Londoño, Services Analyst at RedCLARA.

To apply, interested teams must present a clearly defined scientific or technological problem related to molecular interactions or regulatory networks, demonstrate knowledge in the life sciences and capabilities in computing or artificial intelligence, and commit 10-15 hours per week for 8 weeks to develop the project. At the end of the programme, participating teams will present their results at a regional Demo Day, where progress and lessons learned will be shared.

The call is open to universities, research centres, university hospitals, biotech start-ups, academic spin-offs, scientific groups, and innovation ecosystem actors linked to the life sciences. Teams may be multidisciplinary and inter-institutional, and at least one member must be affiliated with an institution that is part of a National Research and Education Network (NREN) in the region.

The Early Adopters Programme was officially presented during a regional webinar held on 11 March, where researchers, developers, and representatives from the scientific and technological ecosystem learned about the BIO+IA Testbed's capabilities and the opportunities this infrastructure offers.

“BELLA II testbeds are designed as spaces where the region can experiment, learn, and build its own solutions. They are not only technological infrastructure, but environments that create the conditions for researchers, universities, and innovation teams to test ideas, develop prototypes, and generate new knowledge using advanced capabilities such as bioinformatics, artificial intelligence, high-performance computing, or blockchain,” said Carlos González during the launch webinar. “We invite the communities of Latin America and the Caribbean to take advantage of these platforms and participate with their projects to strengthen the region’s scientific and technological ecosystem.”

The BIO+IA Early Adopters Programme is developed within the framework of the BELLA II project, led by RedCLARA and co-funded by the European Union. The initiative is carried out in collaboration with the National Research and Education Networks of Mexico (CUDI), Colombia (RENATA), and Chile (REUNA), as well as the University of the Andes of Venezuela (ULA) and other academic partners in the region, who contribute to the development and mentoring of the selected projects.