We are pleased to announce that Dr. Miguel A. Cerqueira has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of the Section “Gel Applications” in Gels (ISSN: 2310-2861). Dr. Miguel A. Cerqueira is a Staff Researcher in the Food Processing and Nutrition Group at the International Iberian Nanotechnology Laboratory (INL), and his research is focused on the development of nanosized bio-based structures for food applications. He works on edible and biodegradable films and coatings for packaging, the encapsulation of functional compounds using emergent encapsulation technologies, and the structuring of gels, such as emulgels and oleogels.
Dr. Miguel A. Cerqueira holds a Ph.D. degree in biological engineering from the University of Minho (UM). In 2011, he started as a Postdoctoral Researcher at UM, and in 2016, moved to INL, where he has been working on the development of bio-based micro and nanostructures for different applications. He has been involved in several projects as a principal investigator (PI) and team member, and until now, has raised approximately EUR 5 M in funded projects and contracts with companies. He has authored 145 peer-reviewed scientific articles, published 27 book chapters, 2 patents and is the editor of 4 books (achieving an h‐index of 52). He supervised 13 students (4 Ph.D. and 13 M.Sc.), and at this moment, is the supervisor of 5 Ph.D. students and 3 M.Sc. students. In 2014, he won the Young Scientist Award (sponsored by IUFoST). In 2018, he joined the list of "Highly Cited Researchers" presented by Clarivate Analytics (http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6614-3942).
The following is a short Q&A with Dr. Miguel A. Cerqueira, who shared his vision for the journal with us, as well as his views of the research area and open access publishing:
1. What appealed to you about the journal that made you want to take the role as its Section Editor-in-Chief?
Gels is one of the emergent journals in the field, and since my first contact with the journal as a reader, reviewer and author, the quality of the manuscripts has been increasing, with several top authors submitting their work to the journal. Being Section Editor-in-Chief, I intend to help the journal to publish more interesting work in the field.
2. What is your vision for the Section?
With this Section, I expect to help the authors and readers find some of the most relevant works in the field and help the journal grow.
3. What does the future of this field of research look like, in your view?
Gels can be used in different fields, and therefore, new endeavors and findings are expected in the next few years. The researchers working in universities, research centers and companies are very active in the field, so we can expect brilliant scientific advances in the coming years.
4. What do you think of the development of Open Access in the publishing field?
Opening the research findings to everyone will contribute to the advance of science and technology; therefore, I believe that open access publication is the future of science.
5. Who should contribute to this Section?
All researchers with high-quality work related to gels applications in areas such as biomedical and pharmaceutical, electronics and energy, environment, and food and agriculture.
We wish Dr. Cerqueira every success in his new position, and we look forward to his contributions to the journal.
