Cristina Canal Barnils (Barcelona 1977) is Associate professor at the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, at the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC), head of the PlasmaMedLab(obriu en una finestra nova): Plasmas for BioMedical Applications Laboratory and of the Medical Technologies: Biomaterials & Tissue Engineering research group at the IRSJD(open in new window).

Before joining UPC, she did different research stages at pre and postdoctoral level in different national and international research centres. She has participated and lead a number of research projects, as well as technology transfer projects in the areas of Textile materials, Biomaterials and Cold Plasmas. Her research has led to above 60 publications, and several invited conferences. Her research has been recognized with different awards, including the L’Oreal-Unesco fellowship “For Young Women in Science” (2012), the “2018 Early Career Award in Plasma Medicine“ and the  ICREA Acadèmia 2020.

Her interests are focused in cold plasmas for biomedical applications, particularly: i. Surface modification of biomaterials to control parameters such as adhesion or biological behaviour; ii. Control of drug release from biomaterials; and iii. Therapeutical appications of cold plasmas, for instance, in bone cancers.

She is currently ERC APACHE project(open in new window) Starting Grant leader in a project in the field of atmospheric pressure plasma therapy, her main axis of research being currently focused in the atmospheric pressure plasma therapy of bone cancer treatment in combination with biomaterials.