“We’re honored to train future leaders in biomedical research and healthcare and to support the Lemann Foundation’s important mission to help talented young Brazilians achieve their potential.”
—PETER LIBBY, MD

As part of its mission to support education in Brazil, the Lemann Foundation helps the country’s rising leaders gain access to top-tier U.S. institutions—including the Brigham.

Thanks to the foundation’s recent generous grant to the Brigham, the Lemann Cardiovascular Research Postdoctoral Fellowship Program offers a full-time two-year research training program to three Brazilian fellows each year.

This grant continues more than a decade of partnership between the Brigham and the Lemann Foundation—a philanthropic organization created by Brazilian businessman Jorge Paulo Lemann, a member of Harvard University’s class of 1961. To date, the Brigham’s program has trained more than 26 young physicians and medical scientists interested in cardiology, including the current fellows.

The Lemann Foundation supports candidates committed to education and research upon their return to Brazil. Applicants undergo a rigorous selection and interview process with a Brigham committee led by Peter Libby, MD, a cardiovascular medicine specialist who established the program in conjunction with Jorge Paulo Lemann in 2009. The fellows hail both from better resourced urban centers and less privileged regions of Brazil, where they can make an especially transformative difference.

“Despite Brazil’s great potential in the global economy, the World Economic Forum estimates Brazil has developed less than 60% of our talent, which contributes to persisting inequalities,” explains Anna Laura Schmidt, the Lemann Foundation’s director for academic collaboration. “While our young civic-minded leaders are brimming with talent, they often lack access to resources and networks to drive change in the country in areas such as education, health, and overall quality of public service.”

Lemann Fellows trained at the Brigham have become professors, medical researchers, attending physicians, and mentors at leading Brazilian universities and hospitals.

Under Libby’s direction, Brigham faculty members mentor fellows on research projects that probe atherosclerosis, vascular biology, heart failure, bioengineering, cardiovascular clinical trials and epidemiology, and imaging.

Libby says, “Through the Lemann fellowship, my colleagues and I have the opportunity to mentor outstanding postdoctoral students in cardiology research. We’re honored to train future leaders in biomedical research and healthcare and to support the Lemann Foundation’s important mission to help talented young Brazilians achieve their potential.”