Dr. Maria Jose Santos-Martinez (santosmm@tcd.ie)

Dr. Maria Jose Santos-Martinez is a medical doctor Specialist in Respiratory Medicine from the Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, Spain. She started her research career in 2004, at The Brown Foundation Institute of Molecular Medicine for the Prevention of Human Diseases (University of Texas Health Science-Houston-USA) at that time, under the direction of Professor Ferid Murad (Nobel Laureate in Physiology or Medicine). She moved to Ireland in 2006 where she defended her PhD in 2009 (Trinity College Dublin, TCD) under Professor MW Radomski’s supervision (highly cited Pharmacologist). In 2010 she became Ussher Assistant Professor in Nano-pharmaceutical Drug Discovery (School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences & School of Medicine) in TCD and she is currently an Associate Professor. Her research interests are focused on blood platelets; nanoparticle-cell and nanoparticle-platelet interactions (Nanotoxicology) and cancer. She has developed a novel method for measuring platelet aggregation using a Quartz Crystal Microbalance with Dissipation monitoring (QCM-D). She applies this technology for looking at the effect of nanomaterials and novel formulations on blood and for investigating the interactions of nanoparticles/nanomaterials developed for drug delivery with their targets and the biological barriers that they need to overcome to exert their action. She has built a number of National and International collaborations that have resulted in more than €7 million funding. Maria is a member of the COST action CA17140 (Cancer nanomedicine – from the bench to the bedside) and her publishing record includes 3 book chapters and over 40 peer review articles in highly-ranked international journals.

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research
and innovation programme under grant agreement No 952259.

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