He received his D.V.M. and M.S. degrees from the Universidade Federal Do Rio Grande do Sul in Brazil, and his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois. Since 2012, Cardoso has established a unique program that seamlessly blends his teaching, extension, and research efforts using a business model to give students opportunities to evaluate dairy farms. His research builds from questions asked by dairy producers and focuses on the impact of nutrition on metabolism, reproduction and health in dairy cows, as well as mechanisms of metabolic adaptation.