I am a PhD student working on a Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) grant entitled "Unraveling the secretome signature of brain metastatic breast cancer cells", being supervised by Joana Paredes and co-supervised by Ana Ribeiro. In the last few years, I identified one of the molecular determinants of the secretome of brain metastatic breast cancer cells and validated its impact on the modulation of the brain pre-metastatic niche. Importantly, I identified its ability to modulate the blood-brain barrier (BBB), as well as its impact on microglial activation in vitro and in vivo. Moreover, I analyzed the expression of this protein in samples from breast cancer patients (primary tumors and its paired metastases), demonstrating its value as a poor prognostic factor and its significant association with brain metastases. My position as a research technician and now as a PhD student has granted me with important technical, scientific, and personal skills. In particular, I was able to develop expertise in several techniques, such as secretome/extracellular vesicles (EVs) isolation; organoids culture; and in vivo techniques, including animal handling, perfusion, as well as blood collection and plasma isolation. Moreover, the results that I have been obtaining have been presented at various national and international conferences (7 oral and 10 poster communications), and an article is being prepared for publication in a journal of the specialty.