Alexandre Quintanilha
Encyclopedia
Alexandre Tiedtke Quintanilha, GOSE is a Portuguese scientist, former director of the Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular
Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular
The Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology in Porto, Portugal, was founded in the 1990s as a multidisciplinary research institution in the fields of genetic diseases, infectious diseases and immunology, neuroscience, stress and structural biology.Most of its investigators are University of...

 (Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology) of the University of Porto
University of Porto
The University of Porto is a Portuguese public university located in Porto, and founded 22 March 1911. It is the largest Portuguese university by number of enrolled students and has one of the most noted research outputs in Portugal...

 and Professor at ICBAS - Abel Salazar Institute of Biomedical Sciences.

Biography

Alexandre Tiedtke Quintanilha, GOSE was born in Lourenço Marques (now Maputo
Maputo
Maputo, also known as Lourenço Marques, is the capital and largest city of Mozambique. It is known as the City of Acacias in reference to acacia trees commonly found along its avenues and the Pearl of the Indian Ocean. It was famous for the inscription "This is Portugal" on the walkway of its...

) Portuguese East Africa
Portuguese East Africa
Mozambique or Portuguese East Africa was the common name by which the Portuguese Empire's territorial expansion in East Africa was known across different periods of time...

 on August 9, 1945, at the time a Portuguese
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

 colony. His father, Aurélio Quintanilha, was Portuguese, from the Azores
Azores
The Archipelago of the Azores is composed of nine volcanic islands situated in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean, and is located about west from Lisbon and about east from the east coast of North America. The islands, and their economic exclusion zone, form the Autonomous Region of the...

 islands, and one of the first scientists to study fungi. Aurélio Quintanilha worked in Coimbra, Berlin and Paris. Alexandre Quintanilha's mother was German, from Berlin. The family moved to Mozambique in the 1940s, where Alexandre was born.

Studies

Quintanilha completed his secondary school studies in Lourenço Marques, then went to South Africa to study at university level. He completed his B.Sc. (Hons) in theoretical physics
Theoretical physics
Theoretical physics is a branch of physics which employs mathematical models and abstractions of physics to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena...

 in 1967 (University of the Witwatersrand
University of the Witwatersrand
The University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg is a South African university situated in the northern areas of central Johannesburg. It is more commonly known as Wits University...

, in Johannesburg
Johannesburg
Johannesburg also known as Jozi, Jo'burg or Egoli, is the largest city in South Africa, by population. Johannesburg is the provincial capital of Gauteng, the wealthiest province in South Africa, having the largest economy of any metropolitan region in Sub-Saharan Africa...

), and his Ph.D.
Ph.D.
A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...

 in solid state physics in 1972 (University of Paris
University of Paris
The University of Paris was a university located in Paris, France and one of the earliest to be established in Europe. It was founded in the mid 12th century, and officially recognized as a university probably between 1160 and 1250...

).

Work

Quintanilha switched his focus to biology on moving to California in 1972. He worked for nearly 18 years at the University of California, Berkeley
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...

, in the USA, before returning to Portugal in 1990 and becoming director of the Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular
Instituto de Biologia Molecular e Celular
The Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology in Porto, Portugal, was founded in the 1990s as a multidisciplinary research institution in the fields of genetic diseases, infectious diseases and immunology, neuroscience, stress and structural biology.Most of its investigators are University of...

 (Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology) of the University of Porto
University of Porto
The University of Porto is a Portuguese public university located in Porto, and founded 22 March 1911. It is the largest Portuguese university by number of enrolled students and has one of the most noted research outputs in Portugal...

.

External links

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