João Pedro Ferrari Souza
Name:
João Pedro Ferrari Souza
Job title:
MD-PhD Student
Place of work / study:
Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
Area of Research:
Understanding vascular risk factors contribution for the etiology and progression of Alzheimer’s disease using neuroimaging [1] and fluid biomarkers [2].
How is your work funded?
Brazilian government
Tell us a little about yourself:
I’m a third-year medical student at Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul and, since the middle of 2020, a PhD student at the Biochemistry Department in the same institution. I’ve always been a curious person, who wanted to know the explanation for everything and was frustrated whenever I had to accept knowledge without understanding it. With the start of college, this feeling only increased, leading me to start doing science as an attempt to satisfy my need for answers. Therefore, I joined Zimmer’s Lab, where I’m currently investigating the contribution of vascular risk factors for the etiology and progression of Alzheimer’s disease.
Tell us a fun fact about yourself:
Most of my childhood and adolescence was dedicated to training tennis, which made me almost start a professional tennis player career.
Why did you choose to work in dementia?
Dementia research was not something that I’ve planned. As an undergraduate student, I attended a college class given by my current supervisor (Eduardo R. Zimmer). I was fascinated by his work since brain functioning was something that I’ve always been curious about. Soon after the class ended, I talked to him about his research group and he invited me to join some of their meetings. In the laboratory’s environment, I felt fulfilled, really enjoying both the group and the topic of study. Hence, I just got more and more involved in the dementia field. Fortunately, now I am part of Zimmer’s Lab group.