Dr. Thaís Armangué received a Special Award from the UAB Faculty of Medicine class of 2006. In recent years she has specialized in pediatrics as a MIR in the Hospital Vall d'Hebron and is making specific training in pediatric neurology through a master program. She has recently begun a collaboration with the IDIBAPS group directed by Dr. Josep Dalmau, where she complements the research training in neuroimmunology. Her CV, along with the quality of the project and the group where it will be developed, have made her first first position in the PFIS 2012 call possible.
In recent years Dr. Josep Dalmau and his team have played an important role by describing autoimmunity as a cause of memory, behavior, cognition and psychosis disorders. In 2007 they described the anti-NMDAR encephalitis, which has proved a major cause of autoimmune encephalitis in children. The new project aims to identify new autoantigens associated with pediatric encephalitis and to study the mechanisms involved in its pathogenesis. These studies are essential to seek a more suitable and specific treatment of these diseases. To complete the clinical training Thaís Armangué is planning a stay abroad before the grant ends.