News Report / Profile
Institute of Biochemistry 2009-2014: 5 years, 5 prizes

1) 2009: DOR Award (competition 2008), Grünenthal Foundation
Attributed to Professor Miguel Castanho’s group for the study of neuropeptides kyotorphin and derivatives, in partnership with the group of Professor Isaura Tavares (FMUP).
2) Award attributed by the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation to Marco M. Domingues and Filomena A. Carvalho, PhD students under the supervision of Professor Nuno Santos, for the project “Atomic force microscopy-based molecular recognition of fibrinogen receptors in platelets and erythrocytes. Applications in health and disease”.
3) 2010: 2nd Place in I2P-Ideas to products, I2P Europe
Attributed to a team led by Marta Ribeiro and Henri Franquelim, PhD students under the supervision of the group of Professor Miguel Castanho, for coming second in the European final of the I2P-Ideas to Products competition (Aachen, Germany), for developing a process to evaluate the translocation of the blood-brain barrier.
4) 2010: Frontiers Life Sciences Research, Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation
Awarded to researcher Ivo C. Martins for the project “The interplay between lipid droplets, RNA and the capsid protein during dengue virus assembly”.
5) 2012 and 2013: Astrazeneca Foundation Innovate Award
The Astrazeneca Foundation awarded, in two consecutive editions, two students of the Integrated Master Degree in Medicine of FMUL for research activity performed at the Institute of Biochemistry. André Rocha won in 2012 with the project “A new strategy for therapeutic neovascularization: Low doses of Ionizing Radiation” and Inês Rego de Figueiredo won the 2013 edition with the work "Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia Gene Therapy Targeting the BCR/ABL Fusion Gene. Peptide-mediated gene delivery: siRNA and editing tools” (see article on News@FMUL 37, of October 2013).

And also …
Three prizes “Lecturer of the year for Professor Miguel Castanho", in a direct election by students of the Integrated Master Degree in Medicine.
These are the favourite prizes of the Director of the Institute of Biochemistry, “given by secret, direct and universal vote of the students”, as he makes a point of stressing.
