Margarida Diogo is an Associate Professor at the Department of Bioengineering of IST, lecturing among others the courses “Cell and Tissue Engineering” and “Stem Cell Bioengineering”. She is senior researcher at the Stem Cell Engineering Research Group of iBB, leading the Focus Area of Biology and Engineering of Pluripotent Stem Cells. Her research activities are focused on the development of advanced neural and cardiac tissue models from human pluripotent stem cells and their applications for disease modeling, drug screening and toxicology assays. Margarida finished her MSc in Biotechnology in 1999 and her PhD in Biotechnology in 2004, both at Instituto Superior Técnico.

Ricardo Perdigão Henriques is the CEO of Bionova Capital. He leads the identification of new investment opportunities and the management of Hovione Capital’s portfolio companies.
Ricardo has over 15 years of experience in the life sciences sector in USA and Portugal, from biomedical research to the pharmaceutical industry. Prior to joining Bionova Capital, Ricardo was an Investment Manager at Portugal Ventures and an International Business Analyst at BIAL Labs.
Ricardo is a Harvard and MIT-educated scientist with a BSc in Biochemistry and a PhD in Molecular Oncology, with publications in high-ranking journals such as the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Oncogene (Nature Publishing Group), and Biotechnology Progress.

Cláudia Cavadas is Professor at the Faculty of Pharmacy of the University of Coimbra (UC) and the head of the Neuroendocrinology and Aging Group at CNC – Center for Neuroscience and Cell Biology from UC. At the Faculty of Pharmacy she was Subdirector, member of the Pedagogical Council, elected member of the Scientific Council, of the Assembly and of the Statutory Committee. She was President of the Portuguese Society of Pharmacology. Cláudia Cavadas has a degree in Pharmaceutical Sciences from Faculdade de Farmácia da Universidade de Coimbra, Master in Cell Biology and PhD in Pharmacy, in the specialty of Pharmacology, from UC. From 1998 to 2001 she did her PhD research at the Centre Hopitalier Vaudois and at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland.

Joana Branco is the Executive Director and a Board Member at Biocant – Technology Transfer Association. Joana also serves as a Board of Directors at P-Bio, Portugal’s Biotechnology Industry Organization.
She has over 16 years of experience in the biotechnology field, first as an entrepreneur, co-founding Gene PreDiT, and then as the innovation director at Biocant Park. Over the years she has been responsible for technology scouting activities, business management for science- backed projects, fund raising and project management, providing support and mentoring to entrepreneurs in the life science area.
Joana Branco holds a degree in Biochemistry, University of Coimbra, a PhD in Biomedical Sciences, University of Porto and Baylor College of Medicine – Houston, US, and training in Entrepreneurship from Porto Business School.