Joana is a an Associate Professor at the Physics Department of Instituto Superior Técnico, in Lisbon, and the PI of the Social Physics and Complexity (SPAC) lab at LIP. She is the Director of the Graduate Program Science for Development, aimed at students for the Portuguese-speaking African countries and the coordinator of the Science for Society Initiative, both at the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência.
SPAC works on applying complex systems tools to Public Health and Decision Making. These include theoretical, experimental and computational approaches to epidemiology, critical thinking and disinformation spread.
Very importantly, pretty much all SPAC members also strongly engage in research or public discussions on: AI Ethics, Social Impacts of Big Data, Diversity in STEM, Science Communication and Outreach.
Joana was the recipient of an ERC Starting Grant in 2019 and is hiring. More information here: http://scienceandpolicy.eu/