Cavalheiro obtained his medical degree and PhD at the Escola Paulista de Medicina, Brazil. He did post-doctoral internships at CNRS, France, and University of Rome, Italy. He served as President of the Brazilian National Research Council (CNPq), member of the Executive Committee of International League Against Epilepsy (ILAE) and International Bureau for Epilepsy. He is professor, Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery and Vice-Dean for Planning, Universidade Federal de São Paulo; and Vice-President, Academy of Sciences of São Paulo State, Brazil. He has developed important animal models of epilepsy with over 400 papers in refereed journals and supervised more than 50 PhDs. His honours include the Grã-Cruz do Mérito Científico Nacional, Comendador da Ordem do Rio Branco, Brazil; Michael Prize, Germany; and Milken Family Award, USA. He is full member of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences. He was President of the Brazilian National Research Council (CNPq). More recently, he has been working as an advisor to the Scientific Director of the São Paulo Research Agency (FAPESP), specifically overseeing FAPESP's Research Integrity Office.

Davidovich was educated at the Pontificia U. Catolica, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil and the U. of Rochester, USA (PhD 1975). He is Emeritus Professor at the Federal U. of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He has held several visiting positions in France, Germany, USA and UK. His interests cover quantum optics and quantum information. His research has focused on the emergence of the classical world from the quantum substrate; laser theory; cavity quantum electrodynamics; quantum entanglement; and quantum metrology. He is member of the Braz. Acad. of Sci. and Foreign Associate of the US Natl. Acad. of Sci., European Academy of Sciences, and Chinese Academy of Sciences. He is Fellow of the Optical Soc. of Am. and of the Am. Physical Soc.. He was awarded the Grand Cross of the Natl. Order of Scientific Merit, Brazil (2000), the TWAS Physics Prize (2001), the Braz. Natl. Prize of Sci. (2010), the TWAS Apex Award (2025), and the Willis E. Lamb Award (2025). He was President of the Brazilian Academy of Sciences from 2016 to 2022, and Secretary-General of TWAS (2019-2022).