TERMIS PhD Award for Sophia Dalfino and Carlos Peniche Silva

We are happy to share that both Sophia Dalfino and Carlos Peniche Silva have each received the TERMIS-EU Doctoral Award 2026  for their thesis. 

The TERMIS-EU Doctoral Award was created to empower the next generation of researchers in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. By specifically encouraging PhD students to pursue part of their training and research in institutions from different countries, this award fosters international mobility, cross-cultural collaboration, and the exchange of complementary expertise.

Sophia received the award for her thesis 'The Many Faces of Regeneration: Engineering multifunctional scaffolds for craniomaxillofacial applications'. This thesis explores bone tissue engineering approaches, based on 3D scaffolds, to support new bone and blood vessel formation. Different scaffold shapes, materials, surface modifications, and combinations with soft hydrogels were investigated to improve bone growth and vascularization.

Carlos recieved the adward for his thesis titled 'Advancing Tendon-to-bone enthesis repair: From biomimetic materials to microRNA modulation'. This thesis investigates how to improve enthesis healing by using biomaterials with a biomimetic design to guide enthesis regeneration in rodent enthesis defect models. Moreover, the thesis dives into the microRNA-mediated molecular mechanisms governing the processes of healing and fibrosis and proposes microRNA-based approaches to aid healing and repair of injured entheses.