UNILA began to be structured in 2007 by the Implementation Committee with the proposal to create the Mercosur Institute of Advanced Studies (IMEA), in partnership with the Federal University of Paraná (UFPR) and Itaipu Binacional. On December 12, 2007, then-President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva presented to the National Congress the bill that would later create UNILA. The bill was unanimously approved by all committees, both in the Chamber of Deputies and in the Federal Senate. On January 12, 2010, Law No. 12,189 was sanctioned. The Federal University for Latin American Integration (UNILA) is an autonomous legal entity, linked to the Ministry of Education, with headquarters and jurisdiction in the city of Foz do Iguaçu, State of Paraná.

The UNILA, through the national contract between CAPES and IEEE has an unlimited open access agreement with IEEE that enables researchers to publish articles as open access without open access fees in all IEEE fully and hybrid open access journals. The agreement applies to all original research articles accepted for publication between 5 November 2024 – 30 October 2027. To benefit from this agreement, the corresponding author has to be affiliated with UNILA. Please use the correct institution name and your institutional email address during submi​​ssion. It is recommended for authors to select the CC BY 4.0 license. The open access funding request will be approved by an OA administrator at CAPES. Overlength page charges or color fees are not covered by the agreement and will be charged to authors.