Dr. Teresa Santos-Silva

Nova University of Lisbon,

Clara Immerwahr Awardee 2014

Academic Background

Dr. Teresa Santos-Silva is an Assistant Researcher at Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia, Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal and recently won an FCT-Investigator position, in a very competitive call of the Portuguese Science Foundation (FCT; Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia). She graduated (2001) in Chemistry and had her PhD (2006) in Protein Crystallography.

During her research activities she had the opportunity to solve the structure of different metalloproteins involved in electron transfer and enzymatic processes. She is the principal investigator (PI) of two on-going research projects funded by the Portuguese Science Foundation and of a bilateral agreement with the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD; Deutscher Akadamischer Austauschdienst). She is also referee of the Marsden Fund Royal Society of New Zealand, first/last author of 10 (out of 17) publications and currently the supervisor of three PhD and one MsC student.

Research Interests

In the last years, Dr Teresa Santos-Silva has focused her attention in two main areas of interest: (1) X-ray Crystallography applied to drug design and (2) X-ray Crystallography of molybdenum-related enzymes - mechanisms, cofactor assembly and maturation.

One of these enzymes is Formate Dehydrogenase (FDH), a key protein in formate oxidation, with interesting biotechnological applications. In collaboration with UniCat, she plans to structurally characterize FDH using X-ray crystallography and biological small angle X-ray scattering, unravelling its mode of action while shedding some light in the catalytic processes of CO/CO₂ transformations.