Maria Alexandra Albuquerque Faria Pais

Maria Alexandra Pais is an Associate Professor at the Department of Physics, Faculty of Sciences and Technology, University of Coimbra, Portugal. Her academic career spans over three decades, starting as an Assistant Professor from 1988 to 2023, and advancing to her current position in 2024. She holds a PhD in Internal Geophysics from the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris (1999), and has held visiting research positions at institutions such as the University of Grenoble Alpes and the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris.

Education:

• PhD in Internal Geophysics, Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris (1999)
• MSc in Internal Geophysics, University of Lisbon (1993)
• BSc in Physics, University of Coimbra (1988)

Research Interests: Her work focuses on geomagnetism, particularly the inversion of geomagnetic field models to infer Earth’s core flows, solar activity signatures in geomagnetic data, and geomagnetically induced currents (GICs) in power networks. She leads interdisciplinary teams in space weather research and has coordinated major projects funded by FCT and EU.

Grants & Leadership:

• Principal Investigator (PI) of 3 FCT-funded projects
• Team leader in 4 bilateral programs with French institutions
• Portuguese coordinator of 2 Erasmus+ programs
• Director of the Astronomical and Geophysical Observatory of Coimbra (2020–2022)
• Coordinator of the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master's program GeoPlaNet (2022–2028)

Professional Roles:

• National representative for the International Association of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy (IAGA)
• Member of editorial boards and international conference committees
• Team leader in multidisciplinary projects involving geophysicists, engineers, and data scientists

Labs & Collaborations: Active in the Earth and Space Research Centre (CITEUC) and the Centre for Computational Physics (CFC). Her work integrates observational data from satellites and ground-based observatories to model Earth’s magnetic field dynamics.