Prof. Isabel Rodríguez Fernández

Isabel graduated in Pharmacy from the University of Alcala de Henares and received a PhD in Science from the National University of Singapore in 1999. After her PhD, she worked at the Institute of Materials Research and Engineering (IMRE), A*STAR, Singapore. In 2013 she joined IMDEA-Nanoscience as a Senior Research Prof and currently she works in areas related to the application of micro and nano fabrication technologies on polymeric soft materials to develop functional and biomimetic surfaces for the control of interfacial interactions, wettability, cell adhesion and optical phenomena in applications such as nano-structured antireflective surfaces, superhydrophobic surfaces or self-cleaning surfaces with antibacterial properties.

The group ́s work has applications in areas including:

1. Nano-engineered functional surfaces for medical applications, particularly in the development of antibacterial functionalities and cell culture fluidic platforms for cell biomechanical assays.
2. Multifunctional surfaces. We are developing the methodology to impart onto polymer nanocomposites additional surface properties, particularly those of super-hydrophobicity and self-cleaning based on surface nanotexturing.
3. Polymer optical devices such as polymer lasers, antireflective surfaces and optical sensors. Nanoim- printing is currently employed to enable the fabrication of organic distributed feedback laser (DFB) on plastic materials for sensing applications.