AL Gonçalves graduated in Bioengineering (Biological Engineering Branch) by the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto (FEUP) in 2012 with a final classification of 16/20. In 2013, she started her PhD in Chemical and Biological Engineering at FEUP. The PhD aimed the optimization of culturing conditions of microalgae and cyanobacteria in laboratory and pilot scale to improve both CO2 capture and nutrients uptake from the culture medium. Before concluding the PhD, she worked for 9 months as Wet Biomass Production Manager at Buggypower, one of Europe’s largest closed-system microalgal production unit with 2870 airlift photobioreactors, performing a total volume of 1100 cubic meters. During this experience, she was responsible for the production and laboratory teams, for the implementation of the analytical methods used in the laboratory and for the supervision of a R&D project. From October 2017 and January 2019, she worked as a post-doctoral researcher in the TexBoost – Less comodities More specialties project at Centro Tecnológico das Indústrias Têxtil e do Vestuário de Portugal (CITEVE). During this period, she developed her work in different projects from the Technology and Engineering Department, mainly in project management and research and development activities (development of new textile materials, textile finishes and innovative solutions for different applications). She also participated in the development of project proposals and in some market studies for roadmap definition.
At this moment, AL Gonçalves is working in the Process Intensification for microalgal production and Valorisation (PIV4Algae) project. During the course of this project, she will be working on the optimization of microalgal production process and on the definition of possible routes for biomass valorization.
Regarding the involvement in international collaborations, AL Gonçalves worked in the Laboratoire de Génie des Procédés et Matériaux (France) for 5 months and established collaborations with researchers from the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), resulting in the publication of 3 papers. More recently, she was involved in the co-supervision of an external PhD student from a Brazilian University (Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina), which resulted in the presentation of two posters in an international conference. From september 2019 to January 2020, AL Gonçalves was invited professor at Riga Technical University, teaching Bioreactor Theory and Design.
AL Gonçalves is the author of 23 papers (1 as corresponding author, 12 as first author and 2 without PhD supervisors as co-authors) in international peer reviewed journals, with 676 citations (SCOPUS h-index=12), published 6 book chapters and her research work was discussed in 15 international meetings. She edited a book and is guest editor of the Special Issue on Carbon Capture and Utilisation from Energies. AL Gonçalves was reviewer of more than 15 papers for international journals and, since November 2019, she takes part of the Reviewer Board Member of Applied Sciences. AL Gonçalves was supervisor/co-supervisor of 5 Master students (1 ongoing) and a PhD student (ongoing). The work developed within her PhD was awarded with the Cum Laude distinction by the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Porto and, recently, her work has been recognised with the Medal of Honor L'Oreal for Women in Science 2019.