Ana Catarina Pereira (AC Pereira) was awarded with a competitive Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (FCT) PhD grant (SFRH/BD/148653/2019) and since 2020 she is a PhD student at the Health Sciences Program from the Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra (UC), Portugal. The experimental work has been conducted at the Center for Neurosciences and Cell Biology (CNC), a partner of the Associated Laboratory Center for Innovative Biomedicine and Biotechnology (CIBB), at UC. Previously, she has obtained a master's degree in 2018 in Cellular and Molecular Biology from the Faculty of Science and Technology, UC, after conclusion the bachelor’s degree in Biomedical Sciences from the Faculty of Science and Technology, University of Algarve (UAlg), Portugal, in 2016. As Master and Bachelor student, respectively, AC Pereira was awarded two Merit scholarships, one by the UC in 2018 and the other by the UAlg in 2016. Until now, she published 9 papers in peer-reviewed journals, 4 original papers and 5 reviews and the scientific impact of her research is reflected in the H index (7) and number of citations (224) (Google Schoolar). She presented her work in 10 oral inter(national) scientific meetings and is author of 12 poster communications. AC Pereira received twice the best oral communication award at scientific meetings, namely at the 1st Annual Meeting in Pharmaceutical Sciences, Coimbra, Portugal (2019) and at the 56th Annual Scientific Meeting of the European Society for Clinical Investigation (ESCI), Bari, Italy (2022). She was enrolled as a team member in the FCT's funded project "The ups and downs of cellular stress: the" MAM hypothesis "for Bipolar disorder pathophysiology" (PTDC/MED-NEU/28214/2017). AC Pereira has supervision experience as tutor of a master's project in Cellular and Molecular Biology, and supervised practical classes of Cell Regulation and Research Methods and Techniques from the master’s degree in Biomedical Research, at the Faculty of Medicine, UC. AC Pereira actively participated in several science communication projects and activities, such as the European Night of Researchers (2018), the Brain Awareness Week (2018-2019, 2021-2022), co-authored the Cartoon "A Bipolar Journey" published in the national Público online newspaper in the International Day of Bipolar Disorder 2021 (30 March), and collaborated in the video entitled "Bipolar disorder: another side" promoted by the theater company Marionet (2022) and CNC. The specific aim of her PhD research project was to understand the molecular mechanisms underlying the pathophysiology of neuropsychiatric diseases namely bipolar disorder and schizophrenia, focusing on the dysregulation of cellular stress responses, with a special emphasis on the endoplasmic reticulum-mitochondria communication and its impact on innate immunity and lipid profile, among other crucial cellular events. The ultimate goal is to disclose novel targets for therapeutic intervention and biomarkers for early diagnosis. Keywords: Bipolar Disorder; Schizophrenia; Endoplasmic Reticulum; Mitochondria; Mitochondria-Associated Membranes (MAMs); NLRP3 inflammasome; lipidomics.