Biography
I am a Senior Scientist at Novartis Pharma Lab, which I joined in 2016 as a member of the Antibody Discovery Team. In 2022, I joined the Gene Therapy Team, working on cell line screening and development for improved virus production.
I have been working in the field of Animal Cell Technology since 2002, focusing on upstream and downstream processing development for cell-based biopharmaceuticals. My work has included projects involving viruses, recombinant proteins, and neurotoxicity analysis in 2D and 3D co-cultures to evaluate neuroprotective compounds. These projects were part of various national and international collaborations with academia and industry.
I hold a PhD in Engineering Sciences and Technology with a focus on Biotechnology from ITQB-NOVA (2016). During my PhD, I contributed to improving Adenovirus and Peste des Petits Ruminants (PPR) vaccine production using different strategies in distinct cell lines, covering bioprocess development to final formulation. Notably, I had the privilege of transferring a PPR vaccine formulation to a vaccine production lab in Ethiopia.