Article 40.2 of the Spanish Law on Universities recognises the leading role that research groups play in the development of Universities' research activity, insofar as it establishes that 'without prejudice to the free creation and organisation by the Universities of the structures that, for its development, they may determine and to the free individual research research will be carried out, mainly, in research groups, Departments and University Research Institutes'. Additionally, section 37.1 paragraph j) of Universidad San Pablo-CEU Rules for the Organization and Functioning, approved by Decree 31/2011, of 2 June, issued by the Regional Governing Council of Madrid, establishes that the role of the Rector includes the 'recognition of research groups under the terms established by regulations'.
To this effect, our University has proceeded to establish regulations on the recognition of research groups under which the first call for the recognition of research groups was launched in the 2019-2020 academic year, incorporating such groups into an Official Register created for this purpose in the Vice-Rectorate for Faculty and Research, with each recognised group being assigned to one of the four resulting categories.