Education

I graduated in Chemical Engineering at the Faculty of Engineering of Bilbao in Spain (2008) and followed with a Master in Advanced Materials Engineering at the same faculty (2009-2010). Thanks to a predoctoral grant funded by the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU), I completed an international PhD (2014) under supervision of Prof. J.R. Sarasua entitled "Fabrication and Characterization of Lactide and Caprolactone Based Bioresorbable and Bioactive Polymer Scaffolds for Tissue-Engineering Applications", which got the highest rating (Cum Laude) and the extraordinary doctorate award by the UPV/EHU. During this period, I was awarded with a mobility grant from the UPV/EHU which allowed me to visit the laboratory of Prof. Gaétan Laroche at the Laval University (Quebec, Canada). After my PhD, I joined the Center for Research in Medical Devices (CÚRAM) in Ireland under supervision of Prof. A. Pandit as a postdoctoral researcher (2015-2017) via a postdoctoral grant funded by the Basque Government. In 2016, I also received a Short-term Scientific mission funded by the COST action iPROMEDAI (EU), which gave me the opportunity to do a short-term stage in the laboratory of Prof. Cornelia Palivan at the University of Basel (Basel, Switzerland).

Research

Professionally, I have actively contributed to the scientific community since 2013 with 2 book chapters, 2 patents, 21 contributions to international conferences and over 30 research papers in high-impact factor journals in the field of Materials Science & Engineering and Biomaterials such as Progress in Materials Science, Advanced Functional Materials, Acta Biomaterialia, Advanced Healthcare Materials and Nanomedicine: Nanotechnology, Biology and Medicine, among others. The interest on my work in the scientific community has gradually increased along this period, reaching a total of 510 citations and an h-index of 16 (source: Google Scholar). I have also participated as an invited reviewer in several high-impact factor journals (e.g., Scientific Reports, Biomaterials Science, etc.) and as an expert reviewer for a Marie Curie COFUND fellowship, which demonstrates my growing recognition in the fields of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering.
My main research interests are related to the use of polymeric devices at the nano- and microscale with advanced functionalities to induce specific responses on living cells with the aim of providing a therapeutic and/or regenerative outcome.

Group in Science and Engineering of Polymeric Biomaterials

Publications