Dr Rodrigo Curvello

(completion in 2020) Doctor of Philosophy, PhD, Chemical and Biological Engineering

Thesis title: Engineered nanocellulose hydrogels for biomedical applications

Supervisors: Prof. Gil Garnier and Dr. Rico Tabor.

Employment: Postdoctoral Fellow, Monash University

Rodrigo completed his PhD from Monash University in 2020. He has won the 2020 Mollie Holman Award for his thesis. Rodrigo was also part of the Chemical Engineering COVID-19 task force team, where they developed a low-cost, rapid diagnostic test to detect antibodies against the coronavirus. He was interviewed by 4 TV channels in Brazil including major network Globo, reaching over 250 million people in South America.

Currently, Rodrigo is a postdoctoral researcher at the Loesser Group at Monash University. His current project will be developing a three-dimensional microenvironment to grow human ‘mini-tumours’ named spheroids. The idea is to engineer the cancer microenvironment to understand how tumours are originated and then to support the research for new therapies.