Biography
Tiago graduated in pharmaceutical sciences (PharmD) from the University of Lisbon. He then completed his PhD in medicinal chemistry under the supervision of Dr Francisca Lopes, where he worked on the computational design, synthesis and profiling of potential anti-plasmodial small molecules acting through cytochrome bc1. Next, he moved to the computer-assisted drug design group led by Prof Gisbert Schneider at the ETH Zürich where he worked as a postdoctoral researcher on a range of collaborative projects – spanning from de novo design and microfluidic-assisted syntheses to machine learning for deorphanization of natural products – with both academia and industry. He then returned to Portugal to work as Marie Curie Fellow and senior researcher in the group of Prof Gonçalo Bernardes at the Instituto de Medicina Molecular. There, he co-developed small molecule–ligand conjugates and built machine learning workflows to unveil the modes of action of several high value natural products with anticancer activity. His research resulted in the VC-funded, biotech company TargTex S.A. where he acts as co-founder.
He then moved to the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Lisbon to establish the DigiChem Lab. He became an Assistant Professor at the Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences in 2022 and was promoted to Associate Professor in 2024. He is a member at the Acceleration Consortium at the University of Toronto, a Mercator fellow at the Molecular Machine Learning Priority Program by DFG and a ECB at the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry. He works on the digitalization of chemical sciences, with special focus on merging computation with experimental chemical biology, organic chemistry, medicinal chemistry and nanotechnology. His ultimate goal is translating science from bench to clinic to improve healthcare.
He has published >75 papers with >20 as senior or co-senior author (h-index 33) in journals, such as Nature, Nature Chemistry, Nature Communications, Nature Nanotechnology, Nature Reviews Chemistry and others, delivered >70 presentations at national and international meetings and is inventor in 4 patents (1 granted in the USA, Japan, Australia, EU, Aurasia and is licensed).
Honours & Awards
Medalha Vicente Seabra by the Portuguese Chemical Society
Runner up 2022 EFMC Young Medicinal Chemist or Chemical Biologist in Academia
Invited as Organic & Biomolecular Chemistry New Talent
Invited as RSC Chemical Biology Emerging Investigator
Invited as ChemBioChem ChemBioTalent
Invited as ChemMedChem EuroMedChem Talents
Elected to attend the Young Investigator Workshop EuChemS Division of Chemistry in Life Sciences
“Os Melhores do Portugal Tecnológico” category Software, Exame Informática Magazine
Finalist in SPARK Award for best ETH patent 2014, ETH Zürich
Two best poster prizes, 9th German Conference on Chemoinformatics, Fulda
Bentham Travel Award (ISMC 2010), Bentham Publishers
Sociedade Farmacêutica Lusitana Award, Portuguese Pharmaceutical Association
Merit Award for outstanding academic performance, University of Lisbon
Merit Award for outstanding academic performance, University of Lisbon
Merit Award for outstanding academic performance, University of Lisbon
Current professional activity
2024–present Associate Professor at Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Lisbon
2023–present Full member at the Acceleration Consortium, University of Toronto
2023–present Editor at Results in Chemistry
2023–present Early Career Board at Journal of Medicinal Chemistry
2022–present Mercator Fellow at Molecular Machine Learning Priority Program (SPP2363) at DFG
2022–2024 Assistant Professor at Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Lisbon
2020–present Group leader at Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Lisbon
2019–present Co-founder of TargTex S.A.
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