Meu Dito, Meu Escrito - De Ciência e Cientistas, com um monólogo da caneta

by Maria de Sousa

 

Maria de Sousa is a renowned Portuguese scientist who made significant contributions in the field of Immunology, namely the description of T cell areas and the phenomenon of ecotaxis. After several years as a researcher in the UK and the USA, Maria de Sousa returned to Porto in 1985, to become Full Professor of Immunology at Instituto de Ciências Biomédicas Abel Salazar (ICBAS), University of Porto, and leader of the Iron Genes and the Imune System Research Group at the Institute for Molecular and Cell Biology (IBMC). In 1996, Maria de Sousa was one of the founders of the Graduate Program in Areas of Basic and Applied Biology (GABBA). In recognition of her multiple contributions to science and postgraduate education, Maria de Sousa has received several prizes and awards. In 2010, the University of Porto awarded her the title of Professor Emeritus and in 2012 Professor Maria de Sousa was decorated by the President of the Portuguese Republic with the grade of Grand Officer of the Military Order of Saint James of the Sword, which is intended to distinguish exceptional literary, scientific and artistic merit.

 

The book Meu Dito, Meu Escrito - De Ciência e Cientistas com um monólogo da caneta gathers a collection of texts by Maria de Sousa that provide an historical overview of the Portuguese biomedical research. With this book, Maria de Sousa takes the opportunity to strongly repudiate all of those that throughout history sought to eliminate the best, while at the same time honoring the ones that contributed significantly to Portuguese Science. 

In these difficult days, Maria de Sousa questions whether society should be paying particular attention to the problems facing science, as a way of avoiding that the best scientists cannot achieve excellency in their own country or, worse, do not even recognize their potential and what they could accomplish.

     

The book presentation, entitled Without this Institute there wouldn’t be a book, will feature Professor António Sousa Pereira (ICBAS, University of Porto) and Professor Carlos Fiolhais (University of Coimbra).