Former Members
Meet the people who boosted GCCRC research
Guilherme Braz
Biologist with an M.S. and Ph.D. in Genetics and Plant Breeding from the Federal University of Lavras, Guilherme is a former Associate Researcher at Michigan State University (2018-2020). At GCCRC, he focused on designing vectors and genotyping transgenic and edited events while also developing expertise in GMO regulatory affairs.
Ana Lúcia Mendes Pinheiro
Ana Lúcia is a Biotechnologist (UNIFAL-MG/2018) and MSc. in genetics and plant breeding (ESALQ-USP/2021), with experience in metabolomics, proteomics and plant tissue culture. During her PhD at GCCRC, her research focused on the study of lysine catabolism impact on maize stress responses.
Mateus is a Biologist pursuing a Master's degree in Genetics and Molecular Biology at UNICAMP. At GCCRC, Mateus employed genome editing approaches with a focus on biotechnology and plant editing.
Sophia Gerasimova
Gerasimova was a visiting researcher from Russia. Previously she was a head of Crop Biotechnology Group in the Institute of Cytology and Genetics (Novosibirsk, Russia). Her main research focused is plant biotechnology and genome editing. In GCCRC she developed the genome editing test systems based on transient expression of genetic constructs in protoplast and embryo cells.
Patrícia Brant Monteiro
Ex-Monsanto Regulatory Manager. 7 years crafting funding policies at FAPESP. 8 years in P&D at Orygen, Alellyx, Fundecitrus. International researcher in France, USA. Skilled in program development, biotech, microbiology, molecular biology, and more. Holds PhD, MSc in Biochemistry. BSc in Biological Sciences.
Nathalia Zocal Pereira dos Santos
Nathalia works on project management of public and private sources and financial implementation. She obtained her degree in Biotechnology from UNISO, Brazil (2011), MSc. in Medical Sciences from UNICAMP (2014), and MBA in Project Management from FGV (2022).
Jaderson Silveira Leite Armanhi
Armanhi’s research was related to plant microbiomes and microbial mechanisms involved in plant growth. On his PhD he has created innovative methods for construction and identification of microbial culture collections. Very recently he has also been focused on developing a real-time monitoring system for remote study of plant physiology aiming to investigate biotic and abiotic effects on plant physiology.
Rafael Soares Correa de Souza
Souza main research area at GCCRC regarded to association mechanisms and functional role of plant colonizing microbiome. He has experience in building genome, sequencing and microbiome community analysis. He received his PhD on Genetics and Molecular Biology studying sugarcane bacteria and fungi community during the Saccharome Project.
Viviane’s research interest was focused on the study of maize protein kinases involved with drought stress responses using multidisciplinary approaches that include genetic modification and genome editing.
José Hernandes
Hernandes allied bioinformatics and genome editing approaches seeking the discovery of new genes related to abiotic stress responses, with special focus on drought tolerance. He is also experienced in transposable elements expression as well as structural and molecular control of plant development.
Leticia Rios Vieira
Leticia´s main focus was on maize genetic transformation. She managed routines of plant transformation, in vitro cultivation (plants and tissue culture) and acclimatization of transformed plants. Leticia has experience on plant biotechnology and phisiology of abiotic stress responses.
Barreto worked on the discovery of possible regulators involved in plant mitochondrial biogenesis and stress response. He joined the GCCRC team at 2014 working on gene discovery and gene expression cassette construction. Bachelor in Biotechnology from Federal University of São Carlos – UFSCar (2010) and Ph.D. in Genetic and Molecular Biology from State University of Campinas – Unicamp (2014).
Vinicius Oliveira Almeida
Almeida has experience in working on developing protocols for genetic transformation of Brazilian maize genotypes, QTL markers and proteomics, and transformation processes. He has degree in Biological Sciences from the University of Passo Fundo (Rio Grande do Sul). Between 2012-2013 he was an intern of Embrapa Wheat. In 2013 became part of the internship program at Monsanto. He joined the team of UMIP Genclima in 2014.
Damares de Castro Monte
Damares is a research scientist at Embrapa since 1989. She has background in gene discovery, functional analysis of genes, metabolic pathways genes and identification of gene expression promoters. At the GCCRC, Damares is in charge of innovation process, strategic partnerships and project funding.
Priscila Alves
Priscila is an Agronomist (UFLA) and holds a master's degree in Plant Production (UFLA), and a doctorate degree in Genetics and Breeding (UFV). With a broad background in Genetics and Plant Biotechnology. Priscila works in several areas of the GCCRC pipeline, including DNA construct design, transformation, genotyping, and phenotyping. system biology, and plant physiology response to abiotic stresses.
Fernanda Raush
At the GCCRC, Fernanda was focused on the genotyping of transgenic plants and obtained by genome editing technologies. With background in Agronomy (Federal University of Lavras – UFLA/2002) and Phytopathology (Master UnB/2003; Doctorate UFV/2009), Fernanda is a research scientist at Embrapa since 2010.
Alessandra Koltun
Alessandra's research focused on abiotic-stress-related genes, especially in mitochondrial metabolism, and genes from the GCCRC pipeline. Agronomist (UEL-2012) with a Master's in Science (CENA/USP-2016) and a Ph.D. in Genetics and Plant Breeding (UEM-2021), she has experience in plant breeding, biotechnology, and genetic engineering.
Lucas Riboldi
Lucas’ research at GCCRC was focused on how genes can affect plant responses to the environment and plant physiological monitoring. His research focused on genetically transformed maize phenotyping and abiotic-stress related genes. He is an agronomist (UFSCAR-2010), masters and doctor in Plant Physiology and Biochemistry (ESALQ/USP-2018).
Bruno Nascimento
Bruno is graduated in Informatics for Business Management at Paula Souza State Center for Technological Education (2010). He has experience in Computer Science, with an emphasis on Methodology and Computer Techniques.
