Pereira Lab

Research focus

ERC Starting Grant · 2025

Modeling and targeting cell-extracellular matrix communication to revert tissue fibrosis

Skin fibrosis is a complex disorder characterized by the replacement of healthy tissue by pathological extracellular matrix (ECM). Despite its significant health burden, current treatments such as surgery and laser therapy are largely ineffective, leaving patients without efficient therapies. This gap is due to a limited understanding of how ECM cues and cells of the fibrotic niche co-evolve and interact over time to drive fibrosis. While research in the field has traditionally focused on ECM elasticity as the main driver of fibrosis, the skin does not behave as a purely elastic material, but is instead viscoelastic. Thus, this project challenges the current matrix stiffness-centric view as…

From the public funding record at EU CORDIS. Describes the funded project, not the reviews below.