Location

Rua Câmara Pestana nº 6A 1150-082 Lisboa
Phone: 218803102 Ext: 26033

Duarte C. Barral

Professor Professor Associado
Principal Investigator

Duarte Barral completed the Degree in Microbiology and Genetics in 1997 from the University of Lisbon, Faculty of Sciences and the PhD in Cell Biology in 2003 from Imperial College London.

He was a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School until he took a position as Principal Investigator of the Membrane Traffic in Disease at NOVA Medical School, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa in 2009.

He is currently an Associate Professor at the same School. Duarte Barral has been working in the field of membrane traffic and its regulation by GTPases of the Rab and Arf families for more than 20 years.

He has helped uncover the previously unknown role of several of these proteins, namely Rab27a (Stinchcombe et al., J Cell Biol., 2001; Hume et al., Traffic, 2002), Arl8b (Garg et al, Immunity, 2011), Arl13b (Barral et al, PNAS, 2012; Casalou et al., J. Cell Sci., 2014; Casalou et al., Cancers, 2019) and Rab35 (Kuhns et al., EMBO Rep., 2019), and established that Rab isoforms can be functionally redundant by studying Rab27a and Rab27b in the pigmentary disorder Griscelli syndrome (Barral et al., J Clin. Invest., 2002).

Duarte Barral has a solid track record in attracting competitive funding (>2.75 M€ of funding for projects as PI) and successfully running coordinating research projects (10 11 funded projects successfully concluded). Moreover, he published 39 50 articles in peer-reviewed international journals and has a strong publication track record: h-index 26 27 and a total of 2311 2637 citations (Web of Science/Scopus).

Furthermore, Duarte Barral has an extensive experience in supervision (10 11 post-doctoral fellows, 9 11 PhD students and 8 10 Master students who completed their training under his supervision).

Finally, Duarte Barral has experience in coordinating teams and consortia, as evidenced by several publications as co-last author with researchers from different countries, the integration in projects involving collaborations and the coordination of a Twinning project, with two other European institutions.

  • Cabaço LC, Bento-Lopes L, Neto MV, Ferreira A, Staubli WBL, Ramalho JS, Seabra MC, Barral DC. RAB3A Regulates Melanin Exocytosis and Transfer Induced by Keratinocyte-Conditioned Medium. JID Innov. 2022 Jun 21;2(5):100139. doi: 10.1016/j.xjidi.2022.100139. 
  • Ribeiro N, Albino M, Ferreira A, Escrevente C, Barral DC, Pessoa JC, Reis CP, Gaspar MM, Correia I. Liposomal Formulations of a New Zinc(II) Complex Exhibiting High Therapeutic Potential in a Murine Colon Cancer Model. Int J Mol Sci. 2022 Jun 16;23(12):6728. doi: 10.3390/ijms23126728.
  • Cabaço LC, Tomás A, Pojo M, Barral DC. The Dark Side of Melanin Secretion in Cutaneous Melanoma Aggressiveness. Front Oncol. 2022 May 10;12:887366. doi: 10.3389/fonc.2022.887366.
  • Morleo M, Vieira HLA, Pennekamp P, Palma A, Bento-Lopes L, Omran H, Lopes SS, Barral DC, Franco B. Crosstalk between cilia and autophagy: implication for human diseases. Autophagy. 2023 Jan;19(1):24-43. doi: 10.1080/15548627.2022.2067383.
  • Moreiras H, Bento-Lopes L, Neto MV, Escrevente C, Cabaço LC, Hall MJ, Ramalho JS, Seabra MC, Barral DC. Melanocore uptake by keratinocytes occurs through phagocytosis and involves protease-activated receptor-2 internalization. Traffic. 2022 Jun;23(6):331-345. doi: 10.1111/tra.12843.
  • Barral DC, Staiano L, Guimas Almeida C, Cutler DF, Eden ER, Futter CE, Galione A, Marques ARA, Medina DL, Napolitano G, Settembre C, Vieira OV, Aerts JMFG, Atakpa-Adaji P, Bruno G, Capuozzo A, De Leonibus E, Di Malta C, Escrevente C, Esposito A, Grumati P, Hall MJ, Teodoro RO, Lopes SS, Luzio JP, Monfregola J, Montefusco S, Platt FM, Polishchuck R, De Risi M, Sambri I, Soldati C, Seabra MC. Current methods to analyze lysosome morphology, positioning, motility and function. Traffic. 2022 May;23(5):238-269. doi: 10.1111/tra.12839. Epub 2022 Apr 24. 
  • Hall MJ, Lopes-Ventura S, Neto MV, Charneca J, Zoio P, Seabra MC, Oliva A, Barral DC. Reconstructed human pigmented skin/epidermis models achieve epidermal pigmentation through melanocore transfer. Pigment Cell Melanoma Res. 2022 Jul;35(4):425-435. doi: 10.1111/pcmr.13039.
  • Brito C, Costa-Silva B, Barral DC, Pojo M. Unraveling the Relevance of ARL GTPases in Cutaneous Melanoma Prognosis through Integrated Bioinformatics Analysis. Int J Mol Sci. 2021 Aug 26;22(17):9260. doi: 10.3390/ijms22179260.
  • Silva G, Sales-Dias J, Casal D, Alves S, Domenici G, Barreto C, Matos C, Lemos AR, Matias AT, Kucheryava K, Ferreira A, Moita MR, Braga S, Brito C, Cabral MG, Casalou C, Barral DC, Sousa PMF, Videira PA, Bandeiras TM, Barbas A. Development of Dl1.72, a Novel Anti-DLL1 Antibody with Anti-Tumor Efficacy against Estrogen Receptor-Positive Breast Cancer. Cancers (Basel). 2021 Aug 13;13(16):4074. doi: 10.3390/cancers13164074. 
  • Escrevente C, Bento-Lopes L, Ramalho JS, Barral DC. Rab11 is required for lysosome exocytosis through the interaction with Rab3a, Sec15 and GRAB. J Cell Sci. 2021 Jun 1;134(11):jcs246694. doi: 10.1242/jcs.246694.
  • Moreiras H, Seabra MC, Barral DC. Melanin Transfer in the Epidermis: The Pursuit of Skin Pigmentation Control Mechanisms. Int J Mol Sci. 2021 Apr 24;22(9):4466. doi: 10.3390/ijms22094466. PMID: 33923362; PMCID: PMC8123122.
  • Brito C, Barral DC, Pojo M. Subversion of Ras Small GTPases in Cutaneous Melanoma Aggressiveness. Front Cell Dev Biol. 2020 Sep 23;8:575223. doi: 10.3389/fcell.2020.575223.
  • Casalou C, Ferreira A, Barral DC. The role of ARF family proteins and their regulators and effectors in cancer progression: A Therapeutic Perspective. Front Cell Dev Biol. 2020 Apr 21;8:217. doi: 10.3389/fcell.2020.00217.
  • Moreiras H, Pereira FJC. Neto MV, Bento-Lopes L, Festas TC, Seabra MC, Barral DC. The exocyst is required for melanin exocytosis from melanocytes and transfer to keratinocytes. Pigment Cell Melanoma Res. 2020 Mar;33(2):366-371. doi: 10.1111/pcmr.12840.
  • Casalou C, Faustino A, Silva F, Ferreira IC, Vaqueirinho D, Ferreira A, Castanheira P, Barona T, Ramalho JS, Serpa J, Félix A, Barral DC. Arl13b regulates breast cancer cell migration and invasion by controlling integrin-mediated signaling. Cancers (Basel). 2019 Sep 29;11(10). pii: E1461. doi: 10.3390/cancers11101461.
  • Kuhns S, Seixas C, Pestana S, Tavares B, Nogueira R, Jacinto R, Ramalho JS, Simpson JC, Andersen JS, Echard A, Lopes SS, Barral DC, Blacque OE. Rab35 controls cilium length, function and membrane composition. EMBO Rep. 2019 Aug 21:e47625. doi: 10.15252/embr.201847625.
  • Moreiras H, Lopes-da-Silva M, Seabra MC, Barral DC. Melanin processing by keratinocytes: a non-microbial type of host-pathogen interaction? Traffic. 2019 Apr;20(4):301-304. doi: 10.1111/tra.12638.
  • Correia MS, Moreiras H, Pereira FJC, Neto MV, Festas TC, Tarafder AK, Ramalho JS, Seabra MC, Barral DC. Melanin transferred to keratinocytes resides in non-degradative endocytic compartments. J Invest Dermatol. 2017 Mar;138(3):637-646. doi: 10.1016/j.jid.2017.09.042.
  • Casalou C, Faustino A, Barral DC. Arf proteins in cancer cell migration. Small GTPases. 2016 Oct;7(4):270-282. doi: 10.1080/21541248.2016.1228792.
  • Encarnação M, Espada L, Escrevente C, Mateus D, Ramalho J, Michelet X, Santarino I, Hsu VW, Brenner MB, Barral DC, Vieira OV. A Rab3a-dependent complex essential for lysosome positioning and plasma membrane repair. J Cell Biol. 2016 Jun 20;213(6):631-40. doi: 10.1083/jcb.201511093.
  • Seixas C, Choi SY, Polgar N, Umberger NL, East MP, Zuo X, Moreiras H, Ghossoub R, Benmerah A, Kahn RA, Fogelgren B, Caspary T, Lipschutz JH, Barral DC. Arl13b and the exocyst interact synergistically in ciliogenesis. Mol Biol Cell. 2015 Jan 15;27(2):308-20. doi: 10.1091/mbc.E15-02-0061.
  • Casalou C, Seixas C, Portelinha A, Barros M, Pintado P, Ramalho JS, Lopes SS, Barral DC. Arl13b and the non-muscle myosin heavy chain IIA are required for circular dorsal ruffle formation and cell migration. J. Cell Sci. 2014 Jun 15;127(Pt 12):2709-22. doi: 10.1242/jcs.143446.
  • Tarafder AK, Bolasco G, Correia MS, Pereira FJC, Iannone L, Hume AN, Kirkpatrick N, Picardo M, Torrisi MR, Rodrigues IP, Ramalho JS, Futter CE, Barral DC, Seabra MC. Rab11b mediates melanin transfer between donor melanocytes and acceptor keratinocytes via coupled exo/endocytosis. J. Invest. Dermatol. 2014 Apr;134(4):1056-66. doi: 10.1038/jid.2013.432.
  • Travel grant, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian
  • Harvard Medical School Excellence in Tutoring Award
  • Post-doctoral fellowship, Arthritis Foundation
ORCID: 0000-0001-8867-2407 Researcher ID: E-7548-2013 Google Scholar ID: oH8Y9bYAAAAJ&hl Scopus Author ID: 6602513159 Ciência ID: 8810-DEBC-025E