Our Team

We are a multidisciplinary team of enthusiastic and determined researchers, dedicated to biomedical and health sciences

Spark Lab: Bem-vindo

Principal Investigator

SANDRA VIEIRA

Sandra Vieira graduated in Biochemistry at the Institute for Biomedical Sciences (ICBAS) and Faculty of Sciences (University of Porto), after a training at Utrecht University (Netherlands). She holds a PhD in Biological Sciences (2006) from the University of Aveiro, on Molecular and Cellular Neuroscience topics. She is currently an Assistant Professor of the Department of Medical Sciences (University of Aveiro) and the PI of the Spark Lab. Her main research interests are on Regenerative Medicine topics, but also include Aging and age-associated diseases.

PhD Student

BÁRBARA SOUSA

Bárbara Sousa is a MSc in Biochemistry (University of Aveiro, 2018), and was a Research Fellow in neuroregeneration (2019). She is currently developing her PhD in Biomedicine, on clinically-oriented neuroregeneration topics, in collaboration with the Institute for Stem Cell Research and Regenerative Medicine (ISRM, Dusseldorf, Germany). Her main interests are neuroregeneration, osteoregeneration, electrical stimulation, cell therapy, biomaterials and personalized regenerative medicine.

MARIA RIBEIRO DA CUNHA

PhD Student

MR Cunha is a physiatrist (Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra), Coordinator of the Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) Rehabilitation Unit of the North Rehabilitation Center (CRN – CHVNG/E; since 2014) and Director of the CHVNG/E Quality Management, Risk and Humanization Department. MR Cunha is pursuing a Ph.D in Rehabilitation Sciences at the University of Aveiro, in clinical studies on traumatic SCI subacute patients, pre- and post-rehabilitation, involving OMICs and targeted analyses. Her main interests are SCI, neurogenic bladder and bowel, sexual dysfunction, microbiome and gut dysbiosis.

PhD Student co-supervised

MANUEL TEIXEIRA

Manuel Teixeira holds a Master’s degree in Molecular Biomedicine from the University of Aveiro (Portugal). His thesis addressed proteostasis, inflammatory and vasoactive biomarkers in patients with hypertension. Currently, as a PhD student in Biomedicine at the University of Aveiro, he is trying to assess the pulmonary vascular response to acute exercise in patients with pulmonary hypertension.

PhD student co-supervised

BEATRIZ RIBEIRO

Beatriz holds a Master in Molecular Genetics and Biomedicine by NOVA School of Science and Technology (Caparica, Portugal) and is currently working at Sandra Vieira's "Spark Lab" as a post-graduate research fellow. Her main interests are neuroregeneration, spinal cord injury, molecular biology, gene editing and CRISPR-Cas9.

JOSÉ GABRIEL FIGUEIREDO

PhD student co-supervised

José holds a Master in Molecular Biomedicine by the University of Aveiro (2021). He is currently working as research fellow at Sandra Vieira's "Spark Lab" and his main interests are neuroregeneration, spinal cord injury, molecular biology, and animal and cellular models.

PhD Student

BRUNA CRUZ

Bruna graduated in Biomedical Sciences (2019) at the University of Aveiro and is currently pursuing her Master Degree in Molecular Biomedicine. Her main interests are on neuroregeneration, spinal cord injury (biomedical and clinical research), cell therapy.