Biography

My passion for the biological world began early in my teenhood. At the University of Sao Paulo (USP), I was enrolled at the interdisciplinary Molecular Sciences BSc Course where I studied the natural and formal sciences within an academically diverse community of undergraduates. I became interested in energy metabolism and the free energy transduction through the mitochondrial respiratory chain by means of the aerobic consumption of nutrients. This mechanism for life to remain out of thermodynamic equilibrium has become my greatest passion. While at USP, I conducted my undergraduate research on two mitochondrial proteins of unknown function in yeast and became part of the USP team for the iGEM competition. Additionally, I promoted university life during two Career Fairs, worked alongside the MIT-Brazil programme in the outreach project “Polymers Of Soccer” and became a teaching assistant for biochemistry. During my PhD in Medical Sciences at the Mitochondrial Biology Unit, I seek to study at the molecular level how the respiratory complex I couples the electron transfer from NADH to ubiquinone with proton pumping across the membrane, generating an electrochemical gradient that powers life.

Previous Education

Universidade de Sao Paulo Molecular Sciences