Biography

During my Graduation in Biological Engineering, at the University of Minho (UM) I received two scholar merit awards (2002 and 2003) and a scholarship merit award (2005), finishing the graduation with a classification of 16/20. Then, and from November 2005 to October 2006 I worked as researcher in the Alfa-Valnatura Project at Federal University of Ceará (Br). I started my PhD in November 2006 at UM and during this period I have been in two short-term missions, one at the Chemistry Department, University of Aveiro (Pt) and other at the Department of Process and Chemical Engineering of the University College Cork (Ie). The work performed in collaboration with the University College Cork was selected as finalist of the George Stewart-International Research Paper Competition at IFT Annual Meeting and Food Expo in 2009 (USA). I finished my PhD in December of 2010 and from my thesis I received the Award for the best PhD Thesis 2011 by the School of Engineering of UM. During this period and since the end of my graduation I have maintained the contact with the food industry as consultant (implementation of ISO 22000 and HACCP). From April 2011 to February 2016 I was Postdoctoral Researcher at UM were I developed the project "Development and characterization of Nano-structured systems for food applications".
Since March 2016 I am Research Fellow at INL, and till now I have published: 60 papers in peer reviewed journals; 2 patents; 5 papers in non-peer reviewed journals; 1 book; 13 book chapters and more 80 abstracts in international and national conferences.
I have boosted and maintained my scientific network through: a) short-term missions (Department of Analytical Chemistry and Food Science, University of Vigo - Es, Department of Food Engineering, University of Campinas - Br and Institute of Agrochemistry and Food Technology-CSIC, Valencia–Es) and professional visits (State University of Vale do Acarau, Sobral-CE, Br, Department of Fisheries Engineering, Federal University of Ceará, and Embrapa Agroindústria Tropical, Fortaleza-CE, Br, Department of Food Science, Purdue University, West Lafayette-IN, USA, Department of Food Technology, Federal University of Viçosa - Br; Biochemistry Department, Federal University of Pernambuco - Br); b) and participation in scientific groups, such as: EFFoST/IUFoST Young Scientist Group - International Union of Food Science and Technology; Early Stage Researcher Group of the COST Actions FP1405-Active and intelligent fibre-based packaging - innovation and market introduction; MP1206-Nano-fibres for bio inspired composite materials and innovative industrial applications and FA0904-Eco-sustainable Food Packaging Based on Polymer Nanomaterials; and European Network for Gastrointestinal Health Research (ENGIHR), http://www.engihr.eu/about-us/. This network allowed me to be member of 7 research projects with financial support.
As supervisor I have at this moment 3 on-going MSc students and 2 on-going PhD students. I have co-supervised 8 MSc students and 2 PhD students with concluded theses; one of the thesis originated the work selected as Finalist of the Graduate Student Research Paper Competition, IFT Annual Meeting and Food Expo, 2013 (USA). In 2014 I was selected as one of the winners of the Young Scientist Award, 17th IUFoST World Congress of Food Science and Technology, (Canada).