Maria Augusta Sousa is currently an Associate Researcher at LSRE-LCM/ALiCE/FEUP. She obtained her Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences – Hydrology (2013), from the Faculty of Pharmacy of University of Porto (FFUP). Concurrently, she also acted as an Invited Lecturer at FFUP. From 2013 to 2015, she was a Contract Employee at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and, in 2019, she got her MBA degree at Porto Business School. From 2020 to 2025, M. A. Sousa served as a Manager of the Organic Chemistry department, at the Laboratory of Águas e Energia do Porto, being responsible for quality control analyses and new method development and validation for the determination of different organic parameters.

M. A. Sousa's research focuses on the occurrence, fate, and mitigation of micropollutants - particularly pharmaceuticals and other emerging contaminants - in water and wastewater. She has extensive experience in chromatographic and mass spectrometric techniques (LC-MS/MS, GC-MS), among others. She has been involved in national and international research projects, addressing microplastics and emerging contaminants in wastewater and coastal environments. She has also authored and co-authored multiple scientific communications, including oral and poster presentations at international conferences, in the fields of environmental chemistry and water treatment.