Where Ideas Grow
Raquel Gonçalves
Associate Researcher

Raquel M. Gonçalves graduated in Chemical Engineering at Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade Técnica de Lisboa in 2001 and got a PhD in Biotechnology in the same institution, in collaboration with the Department of Animal Biotechnology at University of Nevada, Reno, USA (2006). She then worked in Bioteca (Lisboa), a private cord blood bank where she implemented the procedures of cell isolation and characterization. In 2007, she joined INEB as a postdoc and in 2009, she became assistant investigator. Since then, she has combining an engineering background with expertise in stem cells and biomaterials to develop therapeutic strategies, first to the hematopoietic system and nowadays to osteo-articular tissues, namely the intervertebral disc. In 2018, she was awarded with a prestigious Humboldt Fellowship for Experienced Researchers that allowed her to spend a sabaptic period in Germany, Ulm. Since 2020 she is Assistant Professor at ICBAS and continues to develop her research in exploring  immunomodulatory therapies based on stem cells and nanoparticles for  intervertebral disc regeneration and deepen the knowledge on intervertebral disc disorders by bioengineering new disease models. In 2020 she co-founded FETALIX, an i3S spin-off company dedicated to develop fetal-based therapies for intervertebral disc.