Maria Jose Oliveira

MJ Oliveira graduated in Biology by the Faculty of Sciences-UPorto (Portugal) in 1996 and completed her PhD degree in Health and Medical Sciences at Ghent University Hospital (Belgium) in July 2004. During her PhD, supervised by Prof M Mareel, MJ Oliveira studied the contribution of the tumour microenvironment for cancer cell invasion and tumour progression. She has demonstrated that bacteria present at the colon (Listeria monocytogenes) stimulates colorectal cancer cell invasion, motility and proteolysis through the release of beta-casein-derived peptides. During this period, she got familiarized with top proteomic techniques, through the collaboration with Joel Vandekerckhove’s at the Department of Biochemistry (Ghent University), and with smallGTPase signalling, through the collaboration with Rheza Ahmadian (Max Planck Institute Dortmund). During her PhD studies, MJ Oliveira published 9 articles, received 4 EMBO/FEBS Fellowships and 3 International Awards. As PostDoc at IPATIMUP (Institute for Pathology and Molecular Immunology of Porto University), MJOliveira demonstrated that Helicobacter pylori stimulates gastric cancer cell invasion, identified the associated molecular mechanisms, and elucidated the functional relevance of E-cadherin missense mutations found on hereditary diffuse gastric cancer patients. During this three years, at Raquel Seruca’s lab, she published 11 articles (3 first author), received twice the 1stLabMed Award and Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian Fellowships. Under the scope of Ciência2007, MJOliveira initiated at INEB a new line of research aiming at understanding the role of macrophages and of Extracellular Matrix components on gastric/colorectal cancer invasion, and to dissect the underlying signaling pathways. Her major goal is to use this knowledge to design new targeted and more efficient therapies to counteract cancer invasion and progression. In 2009, she received a L’Óreal/UNESCO/FCT Prize for Women in Science and, since January 2017, she initiated her own research group (Tumour Microenvironment Interactions) at i3S- Institute for Research and Innovation in Health at the University of Porto. Currently, she is an Investigador FCT Fellow at INEB (since June 2013) and an Afiliated Professor at the Faculty of Medicine of Porto University (since 2008). MJOliveira has 63 accepted publications in international peer review journals with a total of 1906 citations (h=24). From these articles, 5 are first author (4Q1+1Q2) with an accumulated IF of 33,794, 8 are last author , and 48 were already published independently from her PhD supervisor. Most of her results were published in top oncobiology/cell biology journals including EMBOJ, JBiolChem, Cancer Res, J InfectDis, HumMolGenet, ClinCancRes, BBARevCancer, Oncogene, Biomaterials, Cancer Research, and JClinInvest.