Vice Chancellor
Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, UP Manila
Speaker Bionote
Leslie Michelle M. Dalmacio is a Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of the Philippines Manila College of Medicine (UPCM). She has a Master of Science degree in Biochemistry and a PhD in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology (minor in Microbiology), both from the University of the Philippines. She had research fellowships at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole Massachusetts, USA and at the Novartis Institute for Tropical Diseases in Singapore.
Her research deals with virology, the human microbiome, probiotics, and immunodiagnostics. She was awarded as one of the 2012 Outstanding Young Scientists of the National Academy of Science and Technology (NAST) and as a 2026 National Research Council of the Philippines (NRCP) Achievement Awardee for her work on hepatitis viruses, probiotics, and the microbiome.
She is a Fellow of the Philippine Academy of Microbiology (PAM) and former President of the Philippine Society for Microbiology (PSM, 2018-19). She also served as President of the Philippine Society of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (PSBMB, 2020-21) and as member of the Board of Directors in other professional organizations (Philippine Society for Lactic Acid Bacteria; Outstanding Young Scientists, Inc.). She was the Chair of the Medical Sciences Division (2020-2024), Vice President (2022-2023), and President (2023-2024) of the National Research Council of the Philippines (NRCP).
In UP Manila, she has been a member of the Research Ethics Board since 2011, served as the Assistant to the Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs (2016-2023), Director (2021-2023) of the National Graduate Office for the Health Sciences (NGOHS) and Coordinator of the Office of Continuing Education (2014-2018), as well as the Coordinator (2018-present) of the MD-PhD (Molecular Medicine) program of the UPCM and PCHRD. She is currently the Vice Chancellor for Research and Extension of UP Manila.