Maria A. Bicca

Maíra A. Bicca has a pharmacist degree from the Federal University of Santa Catarina – Brazil. She also holds a Master and PhD in Pharmacology, both at the same institution. Her first postdoctoral training was in Immunology, back in Brazil. She was at the Klein Lab, Northwestern University, IL, as a Visiting Scholar as a part of her PhD program and later on she rejoined this lab for her second postdoctoral fellowship in Neurobiology. Maíra holds the Jose Ribeiro do Valle Young Scientist Award granted by the Brazilian Society of Pharmacology, and the Young Scientist Award in Life Sciences, granted by the Brazilian Society of Biochemistry. During her scientific career, she collaborated in different research projects about Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease, pain, viruses and bacterial infection, post-traumatic stress disorder, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis, colitis, and cancer. Maíra’s long term research interests involve the understanding of the neuroinflammatory process, especially how inflammatory molecules and pathways by them activated can contribute to the triggering and progression of many important human diseases as Chronic pain and Alzheimer’s. As a lab team member, she’s dedicating her time to pursue the understanding of underlying mechanisms by which pain affects sleep as well as how sleep deprivation/fragmentation affects painful and inflammatory states. In her spare time, Maíra likes to run, bike, read, play tennis, do yoga, listen to music, and dance.