Beverage Packaging

Ana Sanches Silva is a researcher at the National Institute of Agrarian and Veterinary Research (INIAV, IP). She obtained a degree in Pharmacy from the University of Coimbra, Portugal, and received her European Ph.D. in Pharmacy from the University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, with honors. In addition, she was awarded with the prize for best doctorate student. Ana Sanches-Silva has a remarkable track record (over 100 scientific contributions in peer-reviewed journals or book chapters). She has more than 300 communications in national and international conferences. Her research interests are focused on the evaluation of safety and composition of food and food packaging. Moreover, her special interest is the study of food bioactive compounds and dietary supplements, and development of analytical methodologies for the analysis of bioactive compounds in food. Ana Luisa Fernando is an Associate Professor at Universidade Nova de Lisboa, NOVA School of Science and Technology, Portugal. Researcher at MEtRiCS, Mechanical Engineering and Resource Sustainability Center, hosted by Universidade do Minho and Universidade NOVA de Lisboa. Graduated in Applied Chemistry (UNL), in 1990, with a MSc in Food Technology/Quality (1996, UNL) and a PhD in Environmental Sciences (2005, UNL).

She has been working in the field of Food Technology and Safety, by testing natural compounds extracted from plants into biopolymers for food packaging or as additives for food preservation. She also works in the field of biobased packaging solutions for the Food industry, namely by using biomass and biomass wastes as a source of material for the production of bio-based polymers. Parallel to those activities, she has also been working with industrial crops for more than 25 years, with special interest on studies related with the Sustainability of industrial crops production (use of marginal land; efficient use of water and mineral resources; environmental impact assessment studies to detect options for systems improvement) and also

Supervision: 9 PhD thesis (concluded), 10 PhD underway, 121 MSc thesis (concluded), 76 Graduation thesis (concluded). She is also coordinating nationaly the H2020 and HORIZON projects GOLD, MIDAS and IASIS. Author and co-author os several publications.

Prof. Judith Maria Braganca is a Professor in the Dept. of Biological Sciences, Birla Institute of Technology and Science Pilani, K K Birla Goa Campus. Prof. Braganca joined the Department of Biological Sciences, BITS Pilani, K K Birla Goa Campus as a faculty in 2004 when BITS Pilani established its third campus in Goa. Since then she is involved in teaching a number of courses at the First Degree, Higher Degree and Work Integrated Learning programmes. Her research expertise includes Biodegradable polymers, Biodiversity of Halophiles, Biotechnological applications of halophilic archaea and bacteria and Metal tolerance in microorganisms. Dr. Braganca has a PhD in Microbiology from Goa University in 2003. Her Doctoral work elucidated the biodiversity of halophilic archaea and explored their mechanisms of resistance to arsenic and cadmium.

She has been a Principal Investigator for in house as well as externally funded research projects. Prof. Braganca has over 35 publications in reputed peer reviewed journals and has a number of conference proceedings to her credit. She has presented her research work at numerous National and International conferences. Dr. Braganca currently serves on the Editorial Board of Frontiers in Microbiology, Extreme Microbiology. She has been actively involved as a referee of international journals from Elsevier, FEMS, Springer, etc.

Prof. Braganca is currently Advisor to 5 PhD students and has successfully graduated 3 PhD students besides numerous dissertation and project students. She has served on several thesis/dissertation advisory committees.