José Miguel Pêgo ( MD, PhD) is Assistant Professor at the School of Health Sciences, University of Minho, involved in the teaching of pharmacology. He is the coordinator of the schools¿ Clinical Skills Lab. He is also part of the Neuroscience Research Domain, which integrates the newly formed Portuguese Government Associate Laboratory (LA) ICVS/3B´s. His research activities have been centered in the behavioral and morphological characterization of animal models of anxiety. Presently he is mainly focused on the molecular mechanisms underlying neuroplasticity in stress models of anxiety. He is experienced in rodent behavior analysis, stereology and 3D reconstruction of neurons. He is also involved in the study of the human stress response during written and skills assessment. Presently he is mainly focused on the assessment process in higher education and factors predicting students' performance in tests. He is particularly interested in understanding the environmental and personality factors affecting cognitive performance in tests. The hypothesis is that the assessment process is susceptible to modifiable factors such as stress and anxiety. Therefore, his interest is in identifying personality traits and biomarkers that may predict abnormal or disproportioned stress and anxiety responses in test conditions. The final goal is to create customized coaching strategies in order to modify the student's response to stress and anxiety. As part of its academical activities, JMP is co-coordinating the Clinical Skills Center at School of Health Sciences. He is particularly interested in the field of High-fidelity simulation and its application in postgraduate training. He has also gained keen interest on the field of assessment (both written and in competence based) and has developed an electronic assessment tool that has lead to the creation of a spinoff (iCognitus4ALL - IT solutions, Lda). He is, also, the president of the Reviewing Committee of Written exams at SHS/UM JMP has serve as a reviewer for the following Journals: Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, Brain Research. He as served as a reviewer for India Alliance's Early Career Fellowship Selection Committee JMP was part of the Organizing Committee of the Annual Meeting of the Portuguese Society for Neuroscience in 2009. He was the President of the Organizing Committee of the 1st Meeting of Portuguese Society for Simulation in Healthcare in 2012. He has a 46 publications in peer-reviewed international journals which were cited 1237, displaying an H-index of 181. Has also presented his work in several international meetings/workshops (>48 posters; 22 invited oral communications).