modeling nature from nano to macro
Laura Rodríguez Arco is associate professor (“profesora permanente laboral”) at the Department of Applied Physics, working in the group “Physics of Interfaces and Colloid Systems”. She graduated in Physics at the University of Granada in 2014, was funded by a PhD fellowship from the Andalusia government and the Spanish PhD Fellowship for Training of University Lecturers (FPU for its initials in Spanish). After her PhD she moved to the University of Bristol (UoB) in 2015 to join the group of Prof. Stephen Mann FRS as a Marie Skłodowska-Curie (MSCA) Fellow. In 2017 she started working at University College London (UCL) in the group of Prof. Giuseppe Battaglia. In 2020 she returned to UGR as a Juan de la Cierva-Incorporación fellow.
During her PhD she specialized in the design and mechanical characterization of magnetic field-responsive materials and prepared magnetic biomaterials generated by tissue engineering. Her MSCA project at the UoB dealt with the design and construction of magnetic micromachines based on artificial cell design. At UCL she engineered polymer compartments (polymersomes) used as nanoreactors or in drug delivery.
Her current research at UGR involves the design of materials inspired in nature and remotely controlled by external forces, in two main lines: (i) design and construction of field-responsive synthetic cells, and (ii) development of multiresponse and reconfigurable hydrogels. She has received 2 grants as PI funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, 1 by the Andalusia Regional Government and 1 ERDF grant. In addition, she is the scientist in charge
at UGR of the MSCA Doctoral Network SigSynCell (https://sigsyncell.crpp.cnrs.fr/). In addition,
she has participated as a researcher in 10 research and 2 pre-competitive development
(EU TEMPUS) grants.
She has published 29 articles, 3 invited reviews/reports, and 2 book chapters, including publications in high impact factor journals such as Nat Mater, Nat Comm, Angew Chem Int Ed, Biomaterials or Nanoscale. She enjoys attending conferences and has organised several in the city of Granada (ERMR2014, ICMF23, JICI23, NALS2025, ECIS2026). She has also co-supervised the work of early career researchers such as postdocs (3), PhD students (2), undergraduates and master’s students.
In addition to research, she also enjoys teaching and public engagement activities. She has participated in teaching innovation projects and she was also part of PERFORM, a Horizon 2020 project aiming to engage secondary students with science.