Fluminense Federal University

Fluminense Federal University (UFF) is a Brazilian federal public university headquartered in Niterói, in the state of Rio de Janeiro, and linked to the Ministry of Education. Created on 18 December 1960 as the Federal University of the State of Rio de Janeiro (UFERJ), it resulted from the merger of higher-education institutions that already existed in the former state of Rio de Janeiro. Its current name was established by Law No. 4,831 of 5 November 1965. The historical abbreviation UFERJ should not be confused with UFRJ, a distinct institution, successor to the former University of Brazil, which also adopted its current name in 1965.

The university was formed by bringing together schools and faculties with earlier histories in law, medicine, pharmacy, dentistry, veterinary medicine, engineering, economics, philosophy, nursing and social work. Its precursor institutions include the Faculty of Pharmacy and Dentistry of the State of Rio de Janeiro and the Teixeira de Freitas Faculty of Law, both founded in 1912.

UFF is characterized by a decentralized territorial structure. In addition to its campuses and units in Niterói, it maintains academic units in eight municipalities in the interior of Rio de Janeiro state and an advanced unit in Oriximiná, in western Pará. Its presence outside the metropolitan headquarters dates to the 1960s and was expanded especially from the 1990s onward and during the federal university restructuring and expansion program known as Reuni.

In 2025, the institution had 42 teaching units, 3,341 faculty members and 3,452 technical-administrative employees. Undergraduate education enrolled 51,970 students, of whom 41,019 were in in-person programs and 10,951 in blended or distance-learning programs. Stricto sensu graduate education had 8,109 students distributed among 90 programs and 144 courses.

In addition to teaching and research activities, the university's structure includes the Antônio Pedro University Hospital, libraries, laboratories, clinics and teaching hospitals, Eduff, the UFF Arts Center and the National Symphony Orchestra.

History

Background of higher education in Rio de Janeiro state

The formation of Fluminense Federal University was preceded by almost half a century of development of separate higher-education schools in the former state of Rio de Janeiro. During the first half of the 20th century, Niterói, then the state capital, concentrated professional-training institutions in areas such as health, law, economics and engineering. Some began as private or state institutions and were only later federalized; others were created in close association with the Rio de Janeiro state government. This heterogeneous group of institutions, each with its own property, faculty and traditions, formed the academic basis of the future university.

On 24 February 1912, the Faculty of Pharmacy and Dentistry of the State of Rio de Janeiro was founded in Niterói on the initiative of physicians, pharmacists and dentists. University institutional memory identifies it as one of the earliest durable experiences of higher education in the former state, emerging during a period of expansion in the training of health professionals in Brazil.

In the same year, on 3 June, the Teixeira de Freitas Faculty of Law was founded in the city of Rio de Janeiro. Changes in higher-education regulation made it difficult for the school to remain in the then federal capital, and it was transferred to Niterói, where it came to play an important role in educating the state's legal and political elite. In 1920 it was granted equivalence with federal institutes and was later renamed the Faculty of Law of Niterói. The institution was federalized in 1956 and became the present UFF Faculty of Law.

The medical field began to take shape with the Fluminense Faculty of Medicine, founded in 1925, whose inaugural class was held on 31 May 1926. In its early years the school used hospital and maternal-and-child-health facilities in Niterói and progressively expanded its outpatient clinics, laboratories and clinical services. The institution was federalized in 1950, a decade before the university was created.The Fluminense Faculty of Veterinary Medicine emerged in the mid-1930s with a proposal linked to training professionals for livestock production and rural development. In 1939 it received land separated from the Instituto Vital Brazil for its headquarters, and in 1950 it was federalized. The unit's tradition of practical education later contributed to the creation of UFF experimental facilities in Iguaba Grande and Cachoeiras de Macacu.

During the 1940s and 1950s, higher education in Niterói became more diversified. The Faculty of Economic and Administrative Sciences of Niterói was founded in 1942; the School of Nursing of the State of Rio de Janeiro opened in 1944; and the Niterói School of Social Work was established in 1945. These schools accompanied the state's administrative, urban and public-health expansion and trained professionals for fields that were becoming increasingly important in public service and in Rio de Janeiro society.

Organization and administration

Fluminense Federal University is a federal autonomous public entity linked to the Ministry of Education. It has didactic-scientific, administrative, financial and patrimonial management autonomy under Brazilian law and its Statute.

Superior councils

The main collegiate bodies of the senior administration are:

the University Council (CUV), responsible for political-institutional, administrative and patrimonial matters;

the Teaching, Research and Extension Council (CEPEx), responsible for academic policy;

the Board of Trustees (CUR), responsible for economic and financial oversight.

Rectorate

Central executive administration is exercised by the Rectorate. Its structure includes the Rector's Office, Vice-Rectorate, pro-rectorates, superintendencies and other administrative and advisory bodies.

The pro-rectorates include Administration, Student Affairs, Extension, People Management, Undergraduate Studies, Research, Graduate Studies and Innovation, and Planning.

The Rectorate building in Icaraí was originally built to house the former Hotel Balneário Casino Icarahy. The property was expropriated for the university in 1967 and came to concentrate the central administration and, later, an important part of UFF's cultural structure.

Since 2018, the office of rector has been held by Antonio Claudio Lucas da Nóbrega, with Fábio Barboza Passos as vice-rector.

In 2026, the university-community consultation for the 2026–2030 administration was won by the ticket formed by Roberto de Souza Salles and Luciana Maria Almeida de Freitas. Formal appointment of rectors at Brazilian federal universities follows procedures established in federal law.

Academic units

In 2025, UFF had 42 teaching units, consisting of 25 institutes, ten faculties, six schools and one university application school.

The units have their own directors and collegiate bodies. Departments are the basic units of didactic-scientific organization, while undergraduate programs and graduate programs are administered by coordinators and their respective collegiate bodies.

The academic organization covers all major fields of knowledge. In the humanities and social sciences are, among others, the Institutes of History, Human Sciences and Philosophy, and Letters, as well as the Faculties of Economics, Education and Law.

In the natural and exact sciences, the university includes units such as the Institutes of Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics and Statistics, Geosciences and Biology.

The health area comprises the Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Dentistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, Faculty of Nutrition, Aurora de Afonso Costa School of Nursing, Institute of Collective Health and Biomedical Institute, together with teaching-linked care facilities.

Campuses and territorial presence

The largest concentration of university facilities is in Niterói, but UFF maintains an academic presence in several regions of the state of Rio de Janeiro.

Niterói

Niterói is home to the Rectorate and most of UFF's academic units. The university is not organized as a single university city; its facilities are distributed among large campuses and individual buildings in different neighborhoods.

The two largest complexes are the Gragoatá and Praia Vermelha campuses, located in neighboring waterfront areas of São Domingos and Boa Viagem. Planned from the late 1960s onward, construction intensified in the 1980s and the campuses opened in 1990, concentrating some of the units that until then had operated in buildings scattered across the city.

Gragoatá became the principal complex for the humanities and social sciences, while Praia Vermelha came to house a significant share of engineering, architecture, computing and exact-sciences activities. This concentration, however, never eliminated the university's decentralized urban structure.

In addition to these complexes, the university maintains facilities in Valonguinho, Ingá, Centro, Icaraí and other neighborhoods of Niterói.

Gragoatá Campus

The Gragoatá Campus, in the São Domingos neighborhood, mainly concentrates units in the humanities, applied social sciences, education and languages and literature.

These include the Institute of History, Institute of Human Sciences and Philosophy, Institute of Letters, Faculty of Education, School of Social Work, Faculty of Economics and Faculty of Tourism and Hospitality.

The campus also contains the Gragoatá Central Library, the University Restaurant, student housing, administrative areas, auditoriums and common spaces.

The daily presence of thousands of students and workers has helped reshape the dynamics of São Domingos and nearby neighborhoods, where commercial, cultural and service activities maintain strong ties with the university community.

Praia Vermelha Campus

The Praia Vermelha Campus mainly brings together units in engineering, architecture, computing, and the exact and earth sciences. It is home to the School of Engineering, School of Architecture and Urbanism, Institute of Computing, Institute of Physics and Institute of Geosciences.

The area occupies part of the developed waterfront land beside Guanabara Bay and, together with Gragoatá, forms UFF's largest continuous complex of university facilities in Niterói.

Valonguinho and standalone units

The Valonguinho complex houses units mainly related to biological sciences, chemistry, administration and health.

Teaching

Undergraduate education

UFF offers undergraduate programs in all major fields of knowledge, including health sciences, biological sciences, engineering, exact and earth sciences, humanities, applied social sciences, linguistics, literature and the arts.

At the end of 2025, the Pro-Rectorate for Undergraduate Studies recorded 51,970 students, of whom 41,019 were enrolled in in-person courses and 10,951 in blended or distance-learning courses.

The principal form of admission is the Unified Selection System (SiSU), using scores from the National High School Exam (Enem). Other routes include transfer, change of course, readmission, admission of degree holders and other modalities.

Cinema and Audiovisual

The Cinema and Audiovisual program occupies a particular place in the institution's academic history. Created in 1968 at the Institute of Art and Social Communication, one of its main organizers was filmmaker Nelson Pereira dos Santos, a central figure in Cinema Novo.

UFF's film program became one of the oldest continuously operating programs of its kind in Brazil and has trained filmmakers, screenwriters, producers and audiovisual researchers.

In 2020, the program was recognized as intangible cultural heritage of Niterói.

Distance education

UFF participates in the CEDERJ Consortium and the Open University of Brazil, offering blended and distance-learning courses through centers distributed across the state of Rio de Janeiro.

Graduate education

In 2025, UFF's stricto sensu graduate education comprised 90 programs and 144 courses.

During the same period, 8,109 students were enrolled in stricto sensu graduate education.

The university also offers specialization courses, MBAs, medical residencies, multiprofessional residencies and other forms of postgraduate education.

Research and innovation

The institutionalization of scientific research at UFF occurred alongside the development of graduate education between the 1960s and 1970s. Creation of the Central Research Commission in 1966 and of specific research and graduate-education structures in subsequent years marked the transition from a university predominantly focused on professional education to an institution with organized scientific production. Scientific policy is currently coordinated by the Pro-Rectorate for Research, Graduate Studies and Innovation.

The institution maintains research groups registered with the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq), scientific and technological undergraduate-research programs, specialized centers and hundreds of laboratories distributed across its campuses.

Part of its major scientific infrastructure is organized through the Multiuser Laboratory Management Program, which allows equipment to be shared among researchers and graduate programs.

The university conducts research in fields such as physics, chemistry, materials science, engineering, computing, artificial intelligence, health, biomedicine, environment, geosciences, economics, history, anthropology, communication, languages and literature, and the arts.

Its research centers include the Oral History and Image Laboratory (Labhoi), devoted to research in oral history, memory and visual culture, along with groups specializing in socioenvironmental studies, collective health and clinical research.

In 2025, UFF researchers participated in the approval of four new National Institutes of Science and Technology in collective health, high-energy physics, cinema and audiovisual studies, and anthropology.

University extension

Extension, together with teaching and research, is one of the university's central academic functions. Extension activities were already carried out by precursor schools and by UFERJ's first units, especially in health, social work, veterinary medicine and teacher training. The institutional structure was expanded with creation of the University Extension Coordination in 1975 and later with organization of the Pro-Rectorate for Extension.

Projects cover areas such as education, health, culture, communication, human rights, technology, work and the environment. Activities are developed in municipalities where the university maintains units and in other regions through specific programs.

The José Veríssimo Advanced Unit is one of the institution's oldest experiences of territorial extension, allowing multidisciplinary teams to work in the Amazon.

Health

Antônio Pedro University Hospital

The Antônio Pedro University Hospital (HUAP) is the university's main teaching hospital and forms part of Brazil's Unified Health System (SUS). Located in central Niterói, it provides medium- and high-complexity care, professional education and clinical research.

The hospital originated as a municipal institution. After the Gran Circus Norte-Americano fire in Niterói in December 1961, it played an important role in treating victims. It was later incorporated into the university and progressively took on the function of a university hospital.

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