Raquel Fernández
(Associate Professor)
Web address
Biography
Raquel Fernández obtained her Degree in Chemistry (specialization in Macromolecules) in 2004 at the Faculty of Chemistry of Donostia-San Sebastian of the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU). In October 2004, she was awarded the Leonardo da Vinci fellowship to work at the Laboratory of Coordination Chemistry (LCC/CNRS) of Toulouse (France) for 6 months. In 2005, she joined the Group `Materials + Technologies´ of the Chemical and Environmental Engineering Department at the Polytechnic School of Donostia-San Sebastian (UPV/EHU) thanks to a predoctoral fellowship awarded from UPV/EHU and in 2009 she obtained the PhD Degree from that university. The thesis project focused on the development of epoxy systems modified with azobenzene chromophores with reversible induced birefringence, under the supervision of Prof. Iñaki Mondragon and Dr. Patricia Oyanguren from the National University of Mar del Plata (Argentina), where she enjoyed a 2-month fellowship. In 2011, she was awarded a 2-year postdoctoral fellowship from UPV/EHU to work in the development of materials based on block copolymers modified with azobenzene groups, under the supervision of Prof. Iñaki Mondragon and Dr. Agnieszka Tercjak. In 2012, she spent a 3-month postdoctoral research stay at McGill University (Department of Chemistry) of Montreal (Canada), under the supervision of Dr. Christopher J. Barrett.
Research
Currently, she works at the `Materials + Technologies´ group as lecturer and researcher. She has published more than 36 scientific articles and 2 book chapters. Additionally, she has participated in around 44 national and international conferences and 26 research projects. Her main research line is the synthesis and characterization of different materials modified with azobenzene groups with reversible induced birefringence. In particular, the studied materials are: epoxy systems, block copolymers, nanostructured thermosetting systems by modification with functionalized block copolymers, nanocomposites and multilayer films based on chitosan.