Mariana Fernandes has a MSc degree in Biomedical Sciences from the Instituto de Higiene e Medicina Tropical at the Universidade Nova de Lisboa.
She had her first contact with flow cytometry while working as a research technician and during her Master’s. During this time, she was involved in several projects focused in characterizing the internalization of classic and new antileishmanial drugs or compounds by macrophages infected with Leishmania spp.
Her first flow cytometry work began in 2015, as a technician in the Flow Cytometry Unit at iMM. Afterwards, she moved to the IGC Flow Cytometry Facility as a Research Support Specialist, where she worked for several years. With the obtained experience, she embraced a new challenge, going to the Institute of Microbiology, Infectious Diseases and Immunology at Charité – Universitätsmedizin in Berlin, where she set up and managed the new Benjamin Franklin Flow Cytometry Facility.
In 2021, she was appointed as Head of Flow Cytometry Unit at Instituto de Medicina Molecular João Lobo Antunes (iMM). Due to the merge process between Instituto de Medicina Molecular João Lobo Antunes (iMM) and Instituto de Gulbenkian de Ciência (IGC), since October 2024 she is the Head of Flow Cytometry at the GIMM – Gulbenkian Institute of Molecular Medicine.
Mariana Fernandes has a particular interest in promoting best practices in flow cytometry, especially in sample preparation and panel design. She is committed to developing shared laboratory resources and driving innovative flow cytometry–based solutions that support and advance cutting-edge research projects.