Biography
I am the Head of Bayer Pharma Lab, integrated in the Animal Cell Technology Unit of IBET’s Health & Pharma Division.
I hold a MSc in Molecular Genetics and Biomedicine from NOVA School of Science and Technology (2010) and a PhD in Bioengineering Systems from MIT-Portugal Program (2016). Having pursued my PhD studies at the Advanced Cell Models Laboratory (iBET and ITQB NOVA), and as visiting student at the NTNU (Trondheim, Norway), my doctoral thesis focused mostly on the development of stem cell-based 3D in vitro models of central nervous system for preclinical research. This work contributed for the establishment of neural differentiation methodologies based on stirred culture systems, interrogating functional aspects of neuron-glia interactions, and applying such models for evaluation of viral vectors for gene therapy. In 2016, I joined the Adenovirus Receptors, Trafficking and Vectorology Laboratory at IGMM (Montpellier, France) as post-doc researcher, working on the construction and production of CAV-2 vectors for gene transfer to central nervous system.
I returned to iBET on 2017, to join the Bayer Pharma Lab working on the development of a microfluidics-based antibody discovery platform and next-generation sequencing technology applications. Later, in 2021 I was appointed as Lab Head, coordinating a team of 13 researchers (6 PhDs and 7 MSc).
Major research activities at Bayer Pharma Lab are in the field of antibody discovery and characterization, including target validation and functional assessment of monoclonal antibodies, focusing on oncology and inflammatory diseases.
Additional academic research activities focus on cardiovascular pathologies, understanding the crosstalk between tissue resident cells and immune cells in promoting or resolving pathological features such as fibrosis.