M. Carmo-Fonseca is Full Professor at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Lisbon and Group Leader at the “Instituto de Medicina Molecular, iMM”. She co-founded iMM and served as Director from its inception until 2014. In 2014, she assumed the role of President. She is also co-founder and advisor for GenoMed, a spin-off company of iMM for molecular diagnosis. She was visiting Professor at Harvard Medical School (2011-2013). She is a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (since 1994), Academia Europaea (since 2022), Portuguese Academy of Sciences (since 2000) and Portuguese Academy of Medicine (since 1999). She was elected President of the RNA Society (2021-2022). She served as Editor for the Journal of Cell Science (2009-2023) and the RNA journal (since 2018), and she is a member of the ERC Advanced Grants Panel (LS1). European Research Council (2020-2024). Her lab is known for studies on RNA splicing using a combination of cutting-edge cell imaging and genome-wide approaches. The vision of her research group is to understand how RNA molecules, with their ability to both encode information and exert catalytic activities, contribute to the regulation of gene expression and how this knowledge can be translated into novel disease biomarkers and therapies. Carmo-Fonseca has implemented methodologies that allow tracking single RNA molecules in time and space inside the nucleus of living cells. She did a sabbatical hands-on training at Harvard Medical School, in Tom Kirchhausen's lab, where she developed a strategy that permits direct measurements of intron dynamics in single pre-mRNA molecules in live cells. This approach revealed that splicing can occur much faster than previously thought, opening new avenues to study how kinetic mechanisms contribute to RNA biogenesis. To further investigate the timing of pre-mRNA splicing relative to transcription, Carmo-Fonseca started a collaboration with Nick Proudfoot at the University of Oxford, who had developed a novel strategy for Native Elongation Transcript sequencing (NET-seq). Together they unraveled unanticipated dynamic links between Pol II and the spliceosome. More recently they developed a new approach to characterize nascent RNA, called polymerase intact nascent transcript (POINT) technology. Using this methodology, they mapped nascent RNA 5' ends, established the kinetics of co-transcriptional splicing patterns, and profiled whole transcription units. Prompted by increasing evidence that alterations in pre-mRNA splicing play a role in human disease, Carmo-Fonseca’s group started to investigate whether defects in co-transcriptional RNA processing cause disease phenotypes and could be therapeutic targets. For disease modeling, the lab has implemented human stem-cell derived organoid systems. They are studying the impact of splicing mis-regulation in heart disease and cancer. Carmo-Fonseca has authored more than 175 original research articles, review articles and book chapters with over 13 thousand citations (h index 61). In recognition to her contribution to Science and Society, she received several honors and awards, namely: - Comenda Ordem de Sant’iago de Espada Ilustres Carreira, Portuguese award for literary, scientific, and artistic merit (2001); - Gulbenkian Science Award, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Portugal (2007); - Prémio Pessoa, Portuguese award in Culture, Art and Sciences (2010); - Prémio D. Antónia Ferreira, Portuguese award for Entrepreneurial women (2013); - Prémio Aboim Sande Lemos-Identidade Portuguesa, Portuguese award in Art and Sciences (2018); - Prémio Universidade de Lisboa for her “exceptional journey as a scientist, with relevant contributions in the field of molecular medicine, and public engagement in promoting science and scientific literacy” (2023).