Iva Pashkuleva has a PhD in Organic Chemistry from University of Sofia, Bulgaria. In 2002, she moved to University of Minho, Portugal where started research activities in the area of Biomaterials - she was awarded a Postdoctoral fellowship from Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) to develop her project on surface characterization and modification of starch-based biomaterials. In 2008, she received Career Starting Grant under the Portuguese National Program Compromisso com a Ciência. During this period, Pashkuleva kept her research focus on surface modification of biomaterials (with emphasis on starch and chitosan) as a way to enhance their biocompatibility. She was principal investigator (PI) of two European projects that enabled her to build own network of international collaborations both in academy and industry. In the following period, she was awarded two Development Career Grants: in 2013 under the Portuguese Program Investigador FCT and in 2019 under the programme for Individual Scientific Employment Stimulus. During this last period, Pashkuleva established a new research line focussed on biofunctional glycans and built a small research team, whose core is currently composed by 1 Research associate, 2 Junior researchers, and 2 PhD students. Pashkuleva and her team are working on the elucidation of glycans role in cellular communication and the possibility to explore glycans in design and synthesis of functional biomaterials. They have developed new analytical methods and platforms for characterization of challenging to measure glycan-protein and glycan-cell interactions. Advancements in glycan-based delivery systems were achieved by development of new designs and concepts. The use of glycans in cancer therapies was also explored: for the first-time glycan amphiphiles were used as substrates in selective biocatalytic approach. Extracellular supramolecular mimics were generated by self-assembly of glycans and proteins or their functional simpler analogues carbohydrates and peptides. As PI and Co-PI she successfully obtained funding from FCT and EC in a total amount of approx 5M euros. She has also participated in proposals preparation and research teams of National granted Projects corresponding to a total budget of about 0.87M euros and EC projects corresponding to a total budget of over 3.52M euros. Her expertise has been recognised by different evaluation agencies and peers. She has been acting as a member of different MSc and PhD examination panels and as External Evaluator of Project proposals for EU (H2020, ERA-NET) and different national foundations (Czech Science Foundation, Swiss National Science Foundation, EMPA co-fund programme). During the last years she has been acting as a referee for peer-reviewed journals form Elsevier, Wiley, Taylor & Francis, RSC, ACS. Since 2018, she is an Academic editor for PlosOne, editorial board member of Molecules (MDPI), Cells (MDPI) and a review editor of Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology. Since 2018, Pashkuleva has been supervisor of 6 MSc students, 6 PhD students, and several postdoctoral researchers. During this period, 3 PhD and 4 MSc students defended their theses under her supervision and now, they are successful professionals in the academy, research centers or in the industry. The training at advanced (PostDoc) level has been well-recompensated as the researchers mentored by her have been very successful in pursuing the prestigious international fellowships such as Marie Curie and Ramon y Cajal, but also competitive national grants (FCT CEEC: 2 Junior, 2 Auxiliar and 1 Development grants). Pashkuleva is an elected member of the General Council of the Research Institute of Biomaterials, Biodegradables and Biomimetics (I3Bs) and the Quality Assurance team of the same Institute. She also takes part of the PhD programme in Tissue engineering, regenerative medicine (TERM) and stem cells as well as of the UMinho online course in TERM.