Researcher biography

Dr. Fernanda Cardoso is a Brazil-born Australian researcher interested in natural products, neurotoxins and peptide-based drug discovery. Hailing from the land of samba and sunshine, Cardoso is not your typical neuroscience enthusiast – she's a powerhouse shaking up the world of ion channels and venom-based drug discovery. In her hands, venom transforms from a threat into a source of unprecedented healing potential. Armed with a formidable blend of expertise in pharmacology, immunology, and neuroscience, Cardoso is a maestro in unravelling the secrets of nature's pharmacopeia to study human physiology in fundamental and applied research in neurologic disorders such as chronic pain, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), and neurodegenerative diseases (motor neuron disease, MND; amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, ALS). Please see Dr. Cardoso’s Grants and Publications list for more details.

Before joining the University of Queensland, Dr. Cardoso was part of the Queensland Institute for Medical Research, holding a prestigious CAPES Postdoctoral Fellowship. During this period, Cardoso developed novel platforms for discovering protein and peptide targets of therapies to combat infectious diseases and novel helminth-derived bioactives with anti-inflammatory properties. Please see Dr. Cardoso’s Publications list for more details.

Dr. Cardoso is currently part of the Centre for Drug Discovery and manages many industry and academic projects studying ion channel modulators derived from natural repertoires, particularly from venoms, and the development of novel effective drugs to treat neurological disorders. Dr Cardoso pushes the boundaries of what we thought possible. She's not just studying diseases; she's on a mission to craft ground-breaking drugs that could reshape the landscape of neurological medicine.