Rafaela Salgado Ferreira

Rafaela Salgado Ferreira is an associate professor at the Biochemistry and Immunology Department at Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (UFMG), Brazil. Rafaela graduated in Pharmacy in 2005 at UFMG and got her PhD in Chemistry and Chemical Biology at the University of California San Francisco (2010), mentored by Brian K. Shoichet and James H. McKerrow. Then she did a postdoc at the University of São Paulo, supervised by Adriano Andricopulo, and joined UFMG as an associate professor in 2011. In 2018, Rafaela was a visiting researcher at the Centre de Biochimie Structurale (Montpellier, France). Her research interests and experience are focused on drug design, enzymology and structural biology, especially towards the development of parasitic cysteine protease inhibitors. Currently, she is the head of Biochemistry and Immunology Department at ICB/UFMG. She is a affiliate member at the Center for Discovery and Innovation in Parasitic Diseases (CDIPD) at UC San Diego, USA. Her awards include the LOréal-UNESCO-ABC For Women in Science 2017 - Category Chemistry , LOréal-UNESCO For Women in Science International Rising Talent 2018, and "SBQ-ACS Women in Chemistry Award 2021, Category Emerging Leader" and "Early Career Researcher Award 2022", by the SBQ Medicinal Chemistry Division and 10th BrazMedChem Organizing Committee. (Source: Lattes Curriculum)