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People
Simões Laboratory
STAFF
Maria Luísa Simões, PhD
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR
Maria Luísa was Faculty Research Associate at Johns Hopkins University (USA) and Assistant Professor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (UK) before joining ITM as Associate Professor in 2023. She graduated in 2014 with a PhD in Biomedical Sciences (Nova University Lisbon, Portugal, and Imperial College London, UK). She is the chair-elect for the American Committee of Medical Entomology (ACME), and member of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH) annual meeting scientific committee.
Thais Lemos-Silva, PhD
RESEARCH FELLOW (POSTDOC)
Thais graduated in 2022 with a PhD degree in Cellular and Molecular Biology from the Oswaldo Cruz Institute – Fiocruz, Brazil. She also trained at the National Institutes of Health (USA) and Charles University Prague (Czech Republic). She works on the impacts of climate change on Anopheles innate immunity, and the modulation of the iron metabolism pathways in malaria mosquitoes.
Yarno Valgaerts, MSc
LABORATORY TECHNICIAN
Yarno has a MSc degree in Biomedical Sciences from the University of Antwerp, Belgium. He is responsible for the rearing of Anopheles mosquitoes for the lab and works on projects related to climate change and Anopheles innate immunity.
Luna Dael, MSc
RESEARCH ASSISTANT (PRE-DOCTORAL CANDIDATE)
Luna conducted her MSc thesis in the Simões Lab. Her project focuses on the role of humidity on diverse Anopheles biological processes, innate immunity, and mosquito fitness.
ALUMNI
Siem Adriaenssens, MSc student (2025)
Emma de Neef, MSc student (2024/2025)
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