Carina I. C. Crucho graduated in Applied Chemistry at the Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the New University of Lisbon in 2007 and received her MSc degree in bioorganic chemistry from the same institution in 2010, for which she was distinguished with the FCT Award, attributed to the best finalyear students. She then became a teaching assistant at the Institute of Health Sciences Egas Moniz, where she taught organic chemistry for one year. She received her Ph.D in chemistry - profile Organic Chemistry from Faculty of Sciences and Technology of the New University of Lisbon in 2015. Her accomplishments lead to her winning the Portuguese Young Chemists Award (PYCA) sponsored by Elsevier, which recognized work completed during her PhD in the field of polymeric nanoparticles. Since then, she has been working as a research fellow in IST studying the synthesis of mesoporous silica nanoparticles for theranostic applications. Her current research interests include the synthesis and characterization of carbohydrate-based polymers and the areas of synthesis of nanomaterials, nanomedicine for cancer diagnosis and therapy. More recently she was distinguished with L’Oréal Portugal Medals of Honor for Women in Science 2017.