Carla Carvalho is a Research Fellow in the Nanodevices Group. Her research is focused on the development of biorecognition molecules derived from bacteriophages (e.g. Receptor binding proteins, Endolysin cellular binding domains) and their integration in lab-on-chip devices (magnetoresistive, optical) for diagnosis of bacterial infections and detection of foodborne pathogens. She has also been working on several projects related to the applicability of biosensing platforms for the multiplex detection of disease-relevant biomarkers.
Carla Carvalho holds a PhD degree in Chemical and Biological Engineering from the University of Minho (2010), in which she exploited the bacteriophages as antimicrobial agents for foodborne pathogens. During this period, she was a visiting researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Public Health Agency of Canada and the University of Bristol. She started to be involved in the Biosensing field during her postdoctoral project that focused on the development of biosensing strategies specifically using magnetoresistive platforms and phage receptor binding proteins as recognition molecules for the detection of foodborne bacteria. Currently, she supervises 3 PhD students and a postdoctoral researcher and is the Principal Researcher of the project Phages-on-chip (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-032442) aiming to develop a phage-based optofluidic device for the diagnosis of sepsis.

Selected Publications

• Costa,S.; Dias, N.; Melo, L.; Santos, S.; Azeredo, J.; Carvalho, C.
  A novel flow cytometry assay based on bacteriophage-derived proteins for Staphylococcus detection in blood
  Scientific Reports. 2020; 10: 6260

• Santos, SB.; Cunha, A.; Macedo, M.; Nogueira, N.; Brandão, A.; Costa, S.; Melo, L; Azeredo, J; Carvalho, C.
  Bacteriophage-receptor binding proteins for multiplex detection of Staphylococcus and Enterococcus in blood
  Biotechnology and Bioengineering. 2020; 117:3286–3298

• Garrido-Maestu, A.; Fuciños, P.; Azinheiro, S.; Carvalho, C.; Carvalho, J.; Prado, M.
  Specific detection of viable Salmonella Enteritidis by phage amplification combined with qPCR (PAA-qPCR) in spiked chicken meat samples.
  Food Control. 2019; 99: 79-83.

• Fernandes, E.; Martins, V.C.; Nóbrega, C.; Carvalho, C.M.; Cardoso, F.A.; Cardoso, S.; Dias, J.; et al.
  A bacteriophage detection tool for viability assessment of Salmonella cells.
  Biosensors and Bioelectronics. 2014; 52:239-246.