Luis Lopes da Fonseca, Ph.D.

I was trained as a biochemist, and I am familiar with most common biochemical assays. I wrote my Ph.D. thesis on the elucidation of the metabolism of primary cultures of brain cells (astrocytes and neurons) and had two postdoctoral positions studying the metabolism of trehalose in Saccharomyces cerevisiae and the metabolic response to acid stress in Lactococcus lactis. Most of the metabolic studies were done by NMR (1H, 2H, 7Li, 13C, 15N, 19F, 23Na and 31P) either in vivo (with cells perfused through or immobilized in the NMR tube) or in vitro (isotopomeric analysis or metabolic flux analysis). During these postdoctoral positions I changed the focus of my research from the wet-lab to the computational side to which I now devote all of my research time. My main interest is still on the fundamental elucidation of cellular metabolism, which I undertake with computational models using both continuous and discrete frameworks with mechanistic and canonical formulations. I have also been involved in teaching Computational Systems Biology to undergraduates in biomedical engineering.