Current Students
Project: Unveiling the temporal and spatial hierarchy of HIV-1 viral assembly and its restriction by host innate immunity
Supervised by Ricardo Henriques
Thesis Committee: Maria João Amorim and Tiago Paixão
Aidan is a Bachelor in Microbiology from the Trinity College Dublin and is about to obtain a Masters in Experimental Medicine from Queen's University Belfast. His Masters thesis entitled “Defining the role of newly identified host proteins that are important for rhinovirus replication” was advised by Aurelie Mousnier. Aidan is interested in host-microbe interactions with focus on viruses, but also molecular biology, bioinformatics and microscopy.
Ana holds a Bachelor degree in Biomedical Sciences from the University of Aveiro and a Masters in Molecular Genetics and Biomedicine from the NOVA School of Science and Technology in LIsbon. Her Masters thesis entitled “Characterization of growth and quorum sensing responses in Barnesiella and Muribaculum gut microbiota members” was advised by Karina Xavier. Ana’ favourite scientific domains are microbe-microbe interactions, mechanisms of infection, metabolism, gene regulation and mathematical modelling of biological systems.
Andrea has a Bachelor degree in Biology (Molecular biology and Physiology) from the University of Belgrade where she is concluding a Masters in Biophysics. Her Masters thesis entitled “Effects of IgG from sera of ALS patients on electrophysiological properties of neurons” was advised by Milena Milošević. She has multiple interests but her favourite domain is cognitive and behavioral neuroscience and biological psychiatry.
Project: lnvestigation of key genetic elements that could change the cellular fate during embryonic development: The case of Tgfbr1 controlling phenotypic plasticity
Supervised by Moises Mallo
Thesis Committee: Elias Barriga and Leonor Saúde
Project: Centrosome-Cilia complex Manipulation by Viruses
Supervised by Mónica Bettencourt-Dias and Maria João Amorim
Thesis Committee: Jonathan Howard and Raquel Oliveira
Project: Identification of cell-cell signaling regulated traits in Bacteroides thetaiotaomicron, the most prevalent member of the human gut microbiota.
Supervised by Karina Xavier
Thesis Committee: Paula Duque and Élio Sucena
Andrès holds a degree in Biological Engineering from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and a Masters in Microbiology from the Universidad de los Andes. His Master thesis entitled “Reconstructing a tripartite bacterial consortium with lignocellulolytic capacity and its potential applications in plastic biodegradation” was advised by Diego Javier Jiménez Avella. He is interested in systems biology, microbial ecology and microbial modelling.
https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/mra.00022-22
https://doi.org/10.15446/revfaccienc.v10n1.86805
Carolina is a graduate from the BSc+MSc in Biomedical Engineering and Biophysics from the Nova University of Lisbon. Her Masters thesis entitled “Retrotransposition causes age-dependent neural function decline in Drosophila melanogaster” was supervised by Alisson Gontijo at CEDOC. Carolina is interested in disease mechanisms, cell biology and developmental biology.
Project: Improving Mitotic Fidelity in Pluripotent Stem Cells
Supervised by Raquel Oliveira
Thesis Committee: Lars Jansen and Pablo Sartori
Project: Investigating the cellular mechanisms of compensatory proliferation in the developing vertebrate retina
Supervised by Caren Norden
Thesis Committee: Élio Sucena and António Jacinto
Project: How mitotic transcription inactivation can modulate cell identity and cell fate?
Supervised by Raquel Oliveira
Thesis Committee: Moises Mallo and Marco Fumasoni
Project: The biogenesis of SARS-CoV-2 replication factories.
Supervised by Maria João Amorim and Colin Adrain
Thesis Committee: Caren Norden and Jocelyne Demengeot
Project: Prediction and Super-Resolution Observation of Structural Dynamics
Supervised by Ricardo Henriques
Thesis Committee: Maria João Amorim and Marco Fumasoni
Diana is a Medical Doctor and an accomplished infectious diseases specialist. She got her degree from the Faculdade de Medicina da Universidade de Lisboa and made her medical internship in infectious diseases in the Lisbon University Hospital Centre. She is interested in infectious diseases, infection prevention in vulnerable populations, HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and of course COVID-19.
http://doi.org/10.4236/aid.2013.34045
https://doi.org/10.29021/spdv.74.2.555
http://doi.org/10.20344/amp.7052
Project: A computational framework for the evolution of metabolic networks in the gut environment.
Supervised by Tiago Paixão
Thesis Committee: Karina Xavier and Lounès Chikhi
Fikir is a student of the international EMERALD programme for medical doctors. She got her doctor of Medicine degree from the Hawassa University. She is passionate about her Specialty in Pediatrics and Child Health but she has grown interest in clinical and biomedical research. During her PhD she would like to study innate immunity and inflammation.
https://bmcresnotes.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13104-016-2289-7
Project: Mechanical control of chromatin dynamics during collective cell migration.
Supervised by Elias Barriga
Thesis Committee: Ivo Telley and Caren Norden
Project: Contribution of resistance and disease tolerance mechanisms in the response against infection.
Supervised by Luís Moita
Thesis Committee: Luís Teixeira and Maria João Amorim
Project: Data-driven adaptive microscopy to study cellular entry
Supervised by Ricardo Henriques
Thesis Committee: Mónica Bettencourt-Dias and Elias Barriga
Project: Investigating the influence of pseudostratification for neuroepithelial development.
Supervised by Caren Norden
Thesis Committee: Moisés Mallo and Elias Barriga
Manuel holds a licenciatura degree in Physics from the Universidad Del Valle de Guatemala. His final project thesis entitled “Epidemiological models using graph theory” was advised by Pedro Morales-Almazán. He is currently obtaining a diploma in Quantitative Life Sciences at the International Centre For Theoretical Physics in Trieste. His current interests are on molecular biophysics.
Project: Investigating the cell biology and translocation patterns of bipolar cells’ lamination in the developing vertebrate retina
Supervised by Caren Norden
Thesis Committee: Elias Barriga and Moises Mallo
Project: The impact of quorum sensing manipulation during recovery from diet-induced dysbiosis
Supervised by Karina Xavierand Jocelyne Demengeot
Thesis Committee: Isabel Gordoand Luís Teixeira
Project: Investigating the influence of nuclear and tissue properties in pseudostratified neuroepithelia maturation.
Supervised by Caren Norden
Thesis Committee: Raquel Oliveira and Elias Barriga
Project: Role of nutrient-sensing during the evolutionary adaptation to DNA replication stress
Supervised by Marco Fumasoni
Thesis Committee: Isabel Gordo and Miguel Soares
Marta got her Bachelor’s degree and Masters in Biomedical Sciences from the University of Algarve. She did her final project entitled “Study of the impact of mode of delivery in brain and gut” with John Cryan and her Masters thesis entitled “ClockOME: Searching for oscillating genes in early vertebrate development” was advised by Isabel Duarte and Ramiro Magno. She contributed to FrozenChicken that is not exactly what you would think. Marta’s ultimate ambition is to become a computational neuroscientist to study the processes and circuitry underpinning in human cognition and perception.
https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jchemed.7b00933
http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3765944
https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.02.25.432894
https://doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2021.628439
Project: A functional axis between biliverdin reductase A and Nuclear factor-erythroid factor 2-related factor 2 in macrophage redox homeostasis
Supervised by Miguel Soares
Thesis Committee: Jonathan Howard and Moises Mallo
Miguel studied Biology, the Evolutionary and Developmental branch, at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon and is about to obtain a Masters in Biomedical Research at the Faculty of Medicina of the University de Coimbra. His Masters thesis entitled “The Role of Sp1 in Oligodendrocyte Differentiation: a mechanically regulated transcription factor”, advised by Gisela Santos at Center for Neurosciences and Cellular Biology.
Project: Exploring biofilm formation in gut communities as an important trait for microbiota stability and resilience
Supervised by Karina Xavier
Thesis Committee: Waldan Kwong and Isabel Gordo
Project: Dynamics and mechanisms of Mitotic Transcriptional Inhibition in Drosophila melanogaster
Supervised by Raquel Oliveira
Thesis Committee: Marco Fumasoni and Paula Duque
Project: Insights into the mechanistic bases of disease tolerance in Drosophila melanogaster.
Supervised by Élio Sucena
Thesis Committee: Luís Moita and Isabel Gordo
Project: Understanding the genetic consequences of habitat loss, fragmentation and species interaction through spatial modelling
Supervised by Lounès Chikhi
Thesis Committee: Tiago Paixão and Élio Sucena
Project: Investigating a role in translation for plant SR proteins involved in stress responses.
Supervised by Paula Duque
Thesis Committee: Raquel Oliveira and Jörg Becker
Project: Identification and characterization of novel effector proteins associated with the bee gut bacterial secretion systems
Supervised by Waldan Kwong
Thesis Committee: Giulia Ghedini and Karina Xavier
Project: Cytosolic DNA mimicry at the onset of collective cell migration in vivo
Supervised by Elias Barriga
Thesis Committee: Caren Norden and Vera Martins
Project: Lipolysis mediates metabolic adaptation to SARS-CoV-2 infection
Supervised by Miguel Soares
Thesis Committee: Jocelyne Demengeot and Luís Moita
Teresa got a Bachelor’s degree in Molecular and Cellular Biology and a Masters both from the NOVA Faculty of Sciences and Technology. Her thesis, advised by Miguel Prudêncio at the Institute for Molecular Medicine in Lisbon, was entitled “Comparative immunological analysis of whole-sporozoite malaria vaccines“. She is into host-microbe interactions.
Project: Understanding mechanics of protein conformational changes using finite strain theory
Supervised by Pablo Sartori
Thesis Committee: Ivo Telley and Bruno Correia