Harvard Catalyst Profiles

Fernando (Fer) Estevez-Lopez, PhD, received both his BSc in Sports Sciences and MSc in Neuroscience from University of Granada (Spain) and his PhD in Health Psychology from Utrecht University (the Netherlands). All his postdoctoral stage has been supported by highly competitive personal grants (e.g., Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions) at Ulster University (UK), Erasmus MC (the Netherlands), Wilhelmina Children's Hospital (the Netherlands), Harvard University (USA) and University of Almeria (Spain).

In 2021, Fer moved to Boston to lead his own independent research line, mentored by Prof. Tiemeier, disentangling the temporality of the associations between physical activity, somatic symptoms with a strong focus chronic musculoskeletal pain, and brain development in children and adolescents from the general population. He focused on conducting longitudinal population neuroimaging research using data from international flagship cohorts including thousands of individuals; namely, the Generation R and ABCD studies. Currently, Fer is a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University and Assistant Professor at University of Almeria. As a "Ramon y Cajal" Fellow (the most competitive personal grant in Spain), Fer is establishing is own research group at University of Almeria. Using the knowledge gained from their own population-based research, this group focuses on conducting evidence-based public health interventions to promote optimal health in young people. For those who do not positively respond to these interventions, they design personalised interventions based on understanding the dynamic relationships between key biopsychosocial factors for each individual. Thus, the moto of the group is "from epi to clinic" reflecting their commitment to boost health in all young people leaving no one behind, even those who are more difficult to help and are in the clinic. He is also involved in teaching epidemiology, physical activity for health promotion as well as non-pharmacological management of pain and fatigue in BSc and MSc degrees. He is also advisor of masters, doctoral and postdoctoral students.

Currently, Fer is the principal investigator (PI) of four international projects: (i) towards preventing the consequences of chronic pain in young people: from epi to clinic (funding agency: the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation), (ii) physical activity, somatic symptoms and brain development in young people: a population-neuroimaging investigation (funding agency: Alicia Koplowitz Foundation), (iii) biopsychosocial networks of pain and fatigue in rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases (funding agency: EUropean aLliance Against Rheumatism (EULAR)) and (iv) development of a mobile health app for the self-management of juvenile-onset rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases during transitional care (funding agency: EULAR). He is the leader of the Working Group in Epidemiology of the European Network on Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (EUROMENE). He leads the development of guidelines for harmonising population-based research. In this line, he had the honour of being invited to consultation in the development of the Dutch research agenda for chronic fatigue syndrome. He was the leader of the EULAR Knowledge Translation Sub-committee, which aims at fostering the quick and effective implementation of evidence-based guidelines into practice to improve the care of people with rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases.