On September 1, 2023, Dr. Isabella Fiorello has started as a junior research group leader at the livMatS cluster. She will work on miniaturized, biologically inspired hybrid machines. Before moving to the University of Freiburg, Fiorello received one of the prestigious Fulbright Grants, thanks to which she will spend five months at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena/USA from late October 2023.
Fiorello will develop a new class of biologically inspired microfabricated hybrid machines that can act as multifunctional tools to transport and release substances on complex unstructured environments, such as leaf tissues and soil. The machines will mimic the biological features of selected living organisms, and will be functionalized to precisely release different substances, such as nutrients, pesticides, genetic material or other living organisms. In the future, the machines could be used in precision agriculture, aerospace, and soft robotics.
Isabella Fiorello studied Industrial Biotechnology at the University of Turin/Italy and received a PhD in Biorobotics from the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna in Pisa/Italy in 2021. From 2021 to 2023, she worked as a postdoctoral researcher in the Bioinspired Soft Robotics Laboratory of the Italian Institute of Technology in Genoa/Italy. She was awarded the Young Researcher of the Year Prize 2022 by the energy company "ENI" and the National Geographic Early Career Grant.
More about the research of Isabella Fiorello