I conduct my research at the Group of Astrophysical Plasmas, which is part of the Institute for Plasmas and Nuclear Fusion at Instituto Superior Técnico. My research is funded by the European Research Council through the Consolidator Grant XPACE (No. 101045172). I am interested in the study of the plasma processes that shape high-energy astrophysical environments and use a combination of theory, numerical simulations and laboratory experiments to tackle some very exciting scientific challenges:

• How do cosmic plasmas manage to be such efficient particle accelerators, reaching energies and efficiencies far beyond those of terrestrial accelerators?

• How do relativistic and radiative plasma processes shape the emission of the most extreme astrophysical environments around black holes and neutron stars?

• How do plasma instabilities shape cosmic-ray transport and energy partition in astrophysical plasmas?

• Can we develop more efficient multi-scale plasma simulations by coupling hybrid (kinetic + MHD) algorithms with data-driven reduced models?

• Can we reproduce basic astrophysical plasma processes (e.g. shocks, magnetic reconnection, turbulence) in the laboratory using powerful lasers and particle beams? And we can leverage such studies to develop more efficient particle accelerators and radiation sources?

Find out more about my research here.