Ana Luisa Micaelo has a PhD in Anthropology. Her PhD dissertation titled “Essa terra que tomo de conta: Parentesco e Territorialidade na Zona da Mata de Pernambuco” (2014) was developed at the Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon, and is now in course of publication. This work is dedicated to the description and problematization of family practices related to the use and ownership of land in northeastern Brazil agrarian reform settlements. Since October 2015 she moved to CRIA as a post-doctoral researcher, where she is doing research on the relationship between family and property in the Portuguese context developing her new project "The house of debt: credit constraints and house ownership in contemporary Portugal".