Linking chemistry with surgery to detect cancerous cells in situ
Livia Schiavinato Eberlin explains how her team has developed a hand-held device for surgeons that analyses tissue samples on a mass spectrometer mid-operation
As a child growing up in São Paulo, Brazil, Livia Eberlin spent hours after school playing in university corridors waiting for her father, Marcos Eberlin, to finish work. He founded the Thomson Mass Spectrometry Laboratory at the University of Campinas and is a former president of the International Mass Spectrometry Foundation. Her mother has a degree in biochemistry and worked in a zoology laboratory at the same university until she decided to stay home caring for her children. It’s little surprise that Eberlin herself is a scientist.