Apresentação Pessoal
Carmen Jerónimo, a Biologist by training, is the current Director of the IPO Porto Research Center (since 2021), Scientific Coordinator of the Biobank at IPO Porto (since 2016) and Group Leader of the Cancer Biology & Epigenetics Group (since 2008).
She was born in Angola in 1972 and obtained a Degree in Biology (1994), a Master's Degree in Oncology (1998), a PhD in Biomedical Sciences (2001) and an Aggregation in Pathology and Molecular Genetics (2011) at UP.
She developed her PhD project supervised by Prof. David Sidransky under the GABBA Program at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (JHU) in Baltimore, MD, USA, working on prostate cancer's genetic and epigenetic alterations. She was a Postdoctoral Fellow in collaboration with JHU (2001-2004) and an Invited Researcher at IPO Porto (2004-2008).
She has been a Professor at ICBAS-UP since 2006, regularly teaching in the areas of Biopathology, Oncobiology, and Epigenetics, being coordinator of the Curricular Units of Research Methodologies in Biopathology (Integrated Master's in Medicine), Laboratory Oncology, Epigenetics and Research Project Seminars (Master's in Oncology), Oncobioloy (Master in Bioengineering), Molecular Biology Techniques, Epigenetic Mechanisms in Oncology (Doctoral Program in Pathology and Molecular Genetics) and Cancer Epigenetics (Master's and Doctoral Program in Medicine and Molecular Oncology).
Her research at the IPO Porto Research Center focuses on the characterization of the tumor cell epigenome and the identification of the functional changes involved in the dysregulation of cellular epigenetic homeostasis. In the context of Personalized Medicine, it acts in the development of new epigenetic cancer biomarkers based on liquid biopsies, as well as in the discovery of drugs based on the modulation of epigenetic aberrations. Due to the relevance that Immuno-oncology has demonstrated in recent years, it also investigates the modulation of the epigenetic expression of biomolecules involved in immunological regulation, aiming at improving immunotherapeutic strategies through combination with epi-drugs. More recently, it addressed the contribution of unregulated non-coding RNAs and their interaction with other epigenetic mechanisms in malignant transformation.
She has supervised 7 Post-doctoral fellows, 14 PhD students 83 Master's students and several undergraduate students. Presently she mentors 2 Junior Researchers, 6 PhD students, 1 Research Assistant and 4 Master students.
She collaborated in obtaining a patent (Methods and biomarkers for bladder cancer detection US 20130210011 / EP 2630261 A1 / WO 2012052844 A1), based on a study in partnership with Norwegian Radium Hospital and participated in the EU-funded international project, Seventh Framework Program (EpiDiaCan).
She is the National Delegate for Actions COST CM1406-EPICHEM and COST EPITRAN-CA16120 and a member of the Board of the Section of Urological Research (ESUR) of the European Association of Urology (EAU).
She is a Section Editor at Clinical Epigenetics and Associate Editor at the International Journal of Molecular Sciences and Epigenomes. She regularly acts as an ad hoc reviewer of several scientific journals and Research Grants/projects from national agencies (FCT Investigator Call 2013 and 2015) and International (2003-Health Research Board-HRB-IR; 2006-Associazione Italiana per la Ricerca sul Cancro; 2006,2007-National Medical Research Council – Singapore; 2007,2015-Cancer ResearchUK; 2010-Binational Science Foundation Israel; 2011,2016,2018-Swiss National Science Foundation-SNSF; 2012-WILLIAMS BARKER, MRC, UK; 2013,2015 -Swiss League Against Cancer-KFS; 2013,2015-FWF Austrian Science Fund; 2014-PROSTATE CANCER UK; 2016,2017-Fund for Scientific Research-FNRS – BL; 2019-Agence Nationale de la Recherche, FR; 2019-Fundaciò La Marató, SP).
She has authored or co-authored more than 250 international scientific publications, including 11 book chapters and 54 review articles (H-index 56; Web of Science 1/2024), including first quartile (Q1) magazines, including Clin Cancer Res, Cancers, Cancer Letters, Cell Death Dis, Br J Cancer, Eur J Cancer, J Cell Mol Med, J Hematol Oncol, JNCI, Mol Cancer, Mol Oncol, Nat Commun, Oncogene and PNAS. She co-edited a book on Histone Modifications in Therapy (2020).