By Bruno Cássio – LAIS/UFRN Communication Advisor

When she set foot on Brazilian soil seven months ago from her native Spain, Professor Almudena Muñoz brought with her a series of doubts about her stay in Brazil: “I reflected about my adaptation, I didn’t know how to speak Portuguese, I was afraid of the cultural differences and if I would be able to adapt to the work flow of the Laboratory”. The Laboratory she mentions is the Technological Innovation in Health Laboratory of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte (LAIS/UFRN), where she is a researcher. On Monday (26), an electronic publication served as motivation for the visiting professor at UFRN.

Almudena Muñoz is at the top of a list of four professors from the Faculty of Information Sciences, Complutense University of Madrid, who received the highest recognition for the quality of their doctoral theses, the “Extraordinary Doctoral Award”, an honor that takes into account the experience and academic production, the curriculum and the data collected in the doctoral research. “My thesis was presented in the midst of the 2020 covid-19 pandemic in the areas of Audiovisual Communication, Advertising, and Public Relations,” clarifies the award-winning professor.

She recalls that she reflected on the lack of cultural content in the programming of Spain’s Open TV. It is this expertise in the audiovisual area that she imprints on her daily research. Currently, Almudena is part of teams that develop projects in the areas of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), the “Syphilis No” Project, and in the production of scientific articles. In fact, it was from the need to popularize the scientific production that “TerCiência” was born, an initiative that disseminates research in social networks with an easily accessible language.

After completing her doctorate, the Spanish researcher says she specialized in scientific dissemination and, with this knowledge, she intends to collaborate more and more with the projects developed by LAIS/UFRN, while planning the classes she teaches in the Department of Communication at the University. “This award, besides being an excellent recognition, can be motivating for young researchers who think of giving up their routines due to the challenges imposed by the research path”, she concludes.

To learn more details about the research developed by Almudena Muñoz, you can click here.