Flávia Rodrigues is a PhD student at the Center of Physics and Engineering of Advanced Materials (CeFEMA), a research unit at Instituto Superior Técnico. In 2017, Flávia Rodrigues received her BSc degree from ESAC in Biotechnology. During her BSc internship she focused on studying the potential neuroprotective effect of minocycline on the retina of an animal model of diabetes. In 2019, Flávia Rodrigues received her MSc degree from the UC in Biochemistry. During her Master's thesis, she focused on combined therapeutic strategies for hepatocellular carcinoma mediated by nanosystems, evaluating their biocompatibility in cancer cell lines. During 2020, she was a research fellow at the Coimbra Institute for Clinical and Biomedical Research (iCBR). Her fellowship was part of the Brain Health 2020 project. She worked on a specific part of that project, entitled “New targets and therapies for retinal diseases”. During that year she was able to publish 2 articles. For the past four years, she has been working on her PhD, namely “Towards the Portable Artificial Kidney: design and mass transfer of a hemocompatible membrane device for blood purification”. Her PhD work focuses on two main areas: 1) the development and characterization of flat-sheet membranes for blood purification, including polymer modification, fabrication of hybrid and nanocomposite membranes, hemocompatibility assays and mass-transfer studies, with emphasis on solute removal from plasma, which is particularly relevant for improving membrane performance; and 2) the design and fabrication of membrane housings with controlled microfluidic flow channels using 3D CAD (Onshape®) and additive manufacturing, optimising geometries, flow conditions and evaluating suitability for blood-contacting medical devices, demonstrating the ability to rapidly redesign, print and test membrane modules adapted to specific needs. During the PhD she was able to publish four articles, be enrolled in six oral communication (three as main speaker) and present six poster communications. Flávia Rodrigues has a multidisciplinary career. She is expert in several laboratorial techniques, namely: 1) molecular biology; 2) cell line cultures; 3) quantification of single molecules techniques; 4) microscopy; 5) animal handling (Course in Laboratory Animal Science); 6) 3D CAD design (Onshape®); 7) membrane fabrication for blood contacting medical devices; and 8) hemocompatibility assays. Furthermore, she has disseminated her work to the general public (e.g. European Researchers' Night, posters and oral presentations) in science communication activities. She has good communication and teamwork skills.