Mafalda Batista Pacheco is a professor and junior researcher at CHAM-Center for the Humanities at the FCSH - Universidade NOVA de Lisboa and Universidade dos Açores and co-coordinator of the research group Art, history and heritage. She is Principal Investigator of the projects "Vaulted South - Vernacular vaulted houses in the South of Portugal" funded by Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT) (EXPL/ART-DAQ/0171/2021) (2022-2023) and "Med Vaults - Research Network of Vernacular Vaulted Houses in the Mediterranean" (UIDB/04666/2020)(2022-2024). She is PostDoc Fellow i the COST Action "Decolonising Development: Research, Teaching and Practice"(CA19129) and "Underground 4 value: Underground Built Heritage as catalyser for Community Valorisation" (CA18110, 2023).

Degree in Architecture (2004), Master in Architecture (2009) and Ph.D in Architecture (2018) by the Instituto Superior Técnico-Universidade de Lisboa, with a FCT Ph.D scholarship  (2012-2016). Previously, she had professional experience collaborating in several architectural studios (2002-2010) in Portugal, Spain and Croatia with a scholarship by IAESTE (2004). Invited lecture of "Conservation, Restoration and Rehabilitation" course at the Master in Architecture, Faculty of Architecture - University of Lisbon (2019-2020). Lecture of optional courses of FCSH - NOVA: "Perspectives on the city" (2024), "Open knowledge and digital tools: Views on the construction of the Portuguese Empire" (2021-2022), "Construction agents in the Portuguese Empire (18th-20th centuries): from documentary sources to digital platforms" (2020-2021), and "From archival data to database: case studies agents of the built environment in the Portuguese Empire (18th-20th centuries)" (2019-2020).

Co-coordinator of Architecture Summer Courses at IST - UL (2013-2018) and coordinator of the summer course "Vernacular Architecture in Portugal" at FCSH - NOVA (2023). Under the scope of Erasmus + Teaching Mobility plan she has taught in different European and African universities: Universidade de Cabo Verde (2021), Université de la Manouba (Tunisia 2021),  Friedensau Adventist University (Germany 2021), Vilnius Tech Faculty of Architecture (Lithuania 2022), Vrije Universiteit Brussel Architectural Engineering (Belgium 2023), Université Mohammed V de Rabat (Morocco 2023), Badji Mokhtar University (Algeria 2023) and Universidad de Granada (2024). She published 6 articles in journals, 10 sections of books, 19 conference papers and has 1 patent registered. Organized 9 events.  Between 2019-2022 she was PostDoc researcher in the project "TechNetEMPIRE-Technoscientific Networks in the construction of the built environment in the Portuguese Empire (1647-1871)" funded by FCT (PTDC/ART-DAQ/31959/2017). She was principal investigator in 4 projects. Her research focuses on the areas of Construction History, History of Urbanism, Vernacular Architecture in Portugal and in the Mediterranean, with published works on these subjects and has received 8 national and international awards for her scientific work.