From 8 to 11 September 2025, the International School on Material Interfaces for Engineering Living Systems (MIELS) brought together students, researchers and professors from biology, chemistry, physics, and materials science to explore how living cells can interact with materials, a field called bio-hybrid interfaces. The goal was to understand how to design materials that combine living and non-living parts.
The program included lectures and discussions on topics such as organic electronics, soft and responsive materials, optogenetics, bioengineering, and 3D bioprinting (a technique that is used to create precise structures by 鈥減rinting鈥� living cells in layers). The school was organised by Prof. Guglielmo Lanzani (Politecnico di Milano), Prof. R貌isin Owens and Prof. Ljiljana Fruk (University of Cambridge), Prof. Giuseppe M. Patern貌 (Politecnico di Milano), and Dr. Vito Vurro (Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia).
Elli received the Best Poster Presentation Award for her work on 3D-printed living materials made from plant cells. Her research focuses on developing living materials by embedding plant cells into hydrogels. Using 3D bioprinting, she arranges the organization of plant cells into specific shapes and then observes how they survive, grow, and proliferate over time. This research helps us understand how to make living, responsive materials that could adapt, repair themselves, or interact with their environment. Such materials can be used in future for eco-friendly manufacturing, environmental monitoring, or advanced healthcare technologies.
We are very proud of Elli and her achievements!