Dora Brites was graduated in Pharmacy by the Faculty of Pharmacy of University of Lisbon (FFULisboa) in 1976. She received her PhD degree in 1988 under the supervision of Prof. Carlos Silveira at FFULisboa, after periods of training at University of Aarhus (Prof Rolf Brodersen), Denmark and Hôpital Saint Joseph in Paris (Prof. François Trivin), France. Her postdoctoral research involved short visits to the Liver Research Center, Trieste, Italy (Prof. Claudio Tiribelli). Habilitation and tenure was achieved in 2004.
Dora Brites is Senior Researcher and Invited Full Professor at FFULisboa for Histology and Embriology, as well as for Physiopathology of Neuroinflammation. She is member of the Directive Board of the Doctoral Program in Integrative Neuroscience, Faculty of Medicine, and is part of the Coordinator Council and Executive Director of Mind-Brain College, ULisboa. Dora Brites is the Leader of Neuron Glia Biology in Health and Disease, a unit of the Research Institute for Medicines (iMed.ULisboa).
Her research interests reside on neurodevelomental and neurodegenerative diseases, with a main focus on dysregulated neuronal-microglial cross-talk during age, stress and inflammation, namely in Ahlzheimer’s disease (AD) and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Identification of biomarkers and targets are used to test and develop innovative neuroprotective therapeutic compounds. Dora Brites has authored more than 100 papers in peer-reviewed journals, was recently awarded with the Santa Casa prize in ALS and is part of the JPND Consortium for developing improved models for studying AD.