Luisa Durães received her PhD degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Coimbra (Portugal). Currently, she is Assistant Professor and Head of the Department of Chemical Engineering of this university. Her research is focused on the design and fabrication of nanostructured materials via wet-routes, mostly sol-gel chemistry but also thermal decomposition, self-assembly, microemulsion, etc. The developed advanced materials, which include aerogels, films and hierarchically built nanoparticles, are being tested for thermo-acoustic insulation, water cleaning and as biomaterials. She has published more than 90 journal articles/book chapters, and supervised 5 PhD thesis (2 on-going) and ca.60 MSc works. Her h-index is currently 28 (Web of Science).