I'm a senior researcher at the Centre for Astrophysics of the University of Porto (CAUP). I obtained my undergraduate degree in Physics and Applied Mathematics (specializing in Astronomy) at the University of Porto in 1993, and completed my PhD in Theoretical Physics at the University of Cambridge in 1997 (passing my viva on 3 October 1997 and formally receiving the degree on 21 February 1998). I work on fundamental cosmology and particle astrophysics, being particularly interested in precision consistency tests of the standard cosmological paradigm and in astrophysical searches for new physics. The observational evidence for the acceleration of the universe demonstrates that our current theories of particle physics and gravity are incomplete. The LambdaCDM model is clearly a simple convenient approximation to a more fundamental theory, and my team and I are using the early and recent universe as a laboratory where we can search for, constrain, identify and ultimately characterize this new physics. My scientific deliverables include 271 peer-reviewed publications, 3 single-authored books, 115 proceedings papers, 17 technical reports/mission studies, 147 oral communications at scientific meetings (of which 42 invited plenary or keynote ones), 125 departmental seminars, and 278 outreach talks (most of them in Portuguese secondary schools). My current h-index is 50. I have organized 46 international conferences/workshops, including the only two IAU symposia held in Portugal, COSMO-11, and several PhD schools. I have been the PI of 11 funded group grants: 4 FCT grants (POCI/CTE-AST/60808/2004, PTDC/FIS/111725/2009, PTDC/FIS-AST/28987/2017 and 2022.04048.PTDC, the last of which is ongoing), 6 FCT/CRUP cooperation grants (1 with Spain, 1 with Germany, 1 with the UK and 3 with France), 2 Gulbenkian grants, and 1 U.Porto grant. I have also been the PI of 5 PRACE and EuroHPC/JU HPC projects corresponding to more than 145 million core hours, and I have been a PI of 4 and CoI of another 32 observing runs (of which 2 are currently active) corresponding to about 356 observing nights, mostly with ESPRESSO on the VLT. At the moment I am supervising 3 PhD theses, 1 MSc thesis and 4 High-school research projects. (In the past I have supervised 3 PhD, 25 MSc/Graduate, 112 Undergraduate and 46 High school projects.) I have also served in the thesis committees of 11 PhD theses (of which 7 were external to U.Porto) and 11 MSc thesis. I received an APS Outstanding Referee Award in 2010, and have refereed manuscripts for 31 different journals. I am a member of several formal collaborations, including ESPRESSO (ESO, Science Team), Euclid (ESA, Cosmology Theory SWG, for which I lead the New Observational Probes Work Package and am one of the Spokespersons in Portugal), ANDES (ESO, for which I am Chair of the Cosmology and Fundamental Physics Working Group), LISA (ESA, Cosmology WG) and SKA (Cosmology WG), as well as ESO's ELT Project Science Team, for which I also coordinate the Line Calibrations Working Group. I am strongly committed to the public understanding of science, being the coordinator of the CAUP Training Unit and actively involved in education, teacher training and outreach activities. I am the scientific director of the AstroCamp, a unique international academic excellence program in the areas of astronomy and physics for high school students which I have created in 2012, with multiple national and international partners including ESO. I also maintain an active interest in the history of ideas in astronomy and cosmology.