Dr. J. Aragó (b. 1983, Valencia) is an Associate Professor (2024) at the Institute for Molecular Science (ICMol) and Dept. Physical Chemistry of the University of Valencia (Spain). Dr. J. Aragó obtained his PhD with academic honours in 2012 at the ICMol (University of Valencia). Upon graduation, he moved to the University of Warwick (UK) for a post-doctoral stay at the group of Prof. A. Troisi after being awarded the prestigious Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship (IEF). Once back to the ICMol in 2016, he was awarded the JdC-Incorporación Fellowship and, in 2018, the Ramon-y-Cajal Fellowship.

Dr. J. Aragó is interested in computational chemistry. In particular, he is mainly focused on the intimate relationship between molecular organization and functionality, which is of utter importance for the design and development of enhanced (supra)molecular systems for technological applications. This requires a broad set of classical and quantum computational techniques (e.g., QM/MM, MD simulations, ab initio CASSCF/CASPT2, DFT-NL, TDDFT, GFN2-xTB, model Hamiltonians, quantum dynamics,…). Currently, his three main research lines are: 1) Modelling of weakly-bonded supramolecular systems, 2) Exciton/charge transport in (supra)molecular materials and 3) modelling of plastic-degrading enzymes.

Dr. J. Aragó has consolidated as a well-reputed scientist in the field of functional (supra)molecular materials from a theoretical perspective. Proof of that is his scientific production with 2 book chapter and 97 publications in international peer-review journals. His work has been cited over 3160 times (Google Scholar, 4th January 2026), resulting in an h index of 34. His theoretical expertise is also recognized being an active reviewer in international journals of Multidisciplinary Chemistry, Materials Chemistry and Physical Chemistry and in the AEI agency for the assessments of research projects and fellowships at national level.

Dr. J. Aragó has already supervised 4 PhD thesis, 9 MSc students and 9 TFGs (final degree projects). J. Aragó actively participates in the Erasmus Mundus Master on Theoretical Chemistry and Computational Modelling (TCCM), not only as a supervisor of students but also as a teacher of one of the subjects (Theoretical chemistry methods I). Finally, he has also collaborated in outreach activities such as “Expociencia” and talks in high-schools to disseminate science in non-specialized contexts.

Mario Culebras, PhD in Chemistry obtained at the University of Valencia (2017). Mario Culebras currently works as lecturer in the physical chemistry department at the University of Valencia. He is also part of the Institute of Material Science at the University of Valencia where he is doing research focused on the recovery of biomass residues to produce advanced nanomaterials, publishing more than 90 articles in peer-reviewed journals, 9 patents, 4 book chapters and presenting more than 50 papers at renowned international conferences. In addition, he works on several national and international research projects, being the principal investigator of several of them.

Professor and researcher focused on the development of biosensors and pathogen detection systems, combining theoretical and experimental approaches to improve and optimize biosensing processes. His career includes research in physical chemistry and electrochemistry, collaboration with industry, and co-supervision of doctoral theses, with a strong emphasis on translating results into innovative technological solutions.

M.Carmen Martínez-Bisbal is graduated in Chemistry (Universitat de València (UV), 1996) and in Biochemistry (UV, 2014). She gained her PhD in 2003 at Physical Chemistry department at UV, on the application of NMR spectroscopy to the study of brain diseases. She is currently Associate Professor at Physical Chemistry Department at UV (from 2022).

She develops her research on in vivo NMR spectroscopy, microNMR, HR NMR spectroscopy and ex vivo HR-MAS NMR spectroscopy, for the study of samples of biomedical interest in the context of different diseases, in the research group MODeLiC in the Interuniversitary Research Institute for Molecular Recognition and Technological Development (IDM UV-UPV), in the Joint Research Unit in Nanomedicine and Sensors between Fundació Hospital La Fe and IDM, and in the research group CB07/01/2012 in the Biomedical Research Network Center in the field of Bioengineering, Biomaterials, and Nanomedicine (CIBER-BBN).

Her research is focused on NMR metabolomics for the study of biofluids, and development of non-invasive biomarkers of disease and progression (bladder cancer Loras et al, Cancers 2019 11: 686, and Cancers 2019 11: 914, Alzheimer Disease Botello-Marabotto et al. Neurobiol.  Dis. 2023 and patent P202030235, PCT/ES2021/070203, glaucoma detection Botello-Marabotto et al. Talanta 2024 and patent P202131032, atheroma plaque vulnerability Botello-Maraboto et al. Talanta 2025, and pulmonary fibrosis Botello-Marabotto et al. J. Med. Virol. 2025).

She also works in the development of new sensors for disease/biomarker detection based on electrochemical sensors (prostate cancer Pascual et al. Analyst 2016, Monreal-Trigo et al. iScience 2022) and based on gated materials for detection (gluten Pla et al. Anal. Chim. Acta 2021, colorectal cancer Pla et al. Nanoscale 2021, mutation in gliomas Pla et al. Sens. Actuators B Chem. 2021) and for targeting cancer cells (colonic tissue González-Álvarez et al. Mol. Pharmaceutics 2017, Bhat et al. Nanoscale 2017)

She is co-author of 55 publications in international journals (over 1777 times cited to papers published, h-index 23). She is inventor of 3 patents. She has participated in 34 research projects (3 European, 15 national, 2 autonomic projects, 14 projects with universities, hospitals and public research institutions).

She has developed research activities with companies. She worked in Hospital Quirón to develop in vivo NMR spectroscopy application in patients (2000-2003). She developed projects with Laboratorios SERONO and Dr. Esteve S.A. She was external collaborator in Philips Sistemas Médicos (2001-2007) for in vivo NMR spectroscopy application in 17 hospitals in Spain and Portugal. She collaborated with Bruker Biospin, to implement the HR-MAS NMR technique to the study of tissue biopsies (Martínez-Bisbal et al. NMR Biomed. 2004, Martínez-Bisbal et al. NMR Biomed. 2009). She collaborated with FACSA for the development of voltammetric electronic tongue for the monitoring of wastewater and spring water (Martínez-Bisbal et al. Electroanalysis 2017, Carbó et al. Sensors 2017, patent P201631405). She collaborated with Buggypower for the development of sensors for quality control in microalgae production (Martínez-Bisbal et al. Sens. Actuators B Chem. 2019).

She has supervised 3 PhD thesis. She is reviewer for Frontiers in Oncology, Anal. Bioanal. Chem., Food Analytical Methods, Sensors, Epilepsia, Frontiers in Pharmacology, Frontiers in Cellular Neuroscience and Metabolomics journals. She has served as international project evaluator for Narodrowe Centrum Nauki – NCN Poland PRELUDIUM call, and she was Remote Referee of ERC Starting Grant. She is secretary of the Department of Physical Chemistry at the Universitat de Valencia since February 2022.

Bachelor in Chemical Sciences (extraordinary degree award 1990) and doctor in Chemical Sciences (1995) from the University of Valencia (UV). After a stay at the Walther-Nernst-Institut of the Humboldt University of Berlin (1995-1997), he joined the Department of Physical Chemistry of the UV, where he worked as a senior research technician (1997-2001) and, since 2002, as a senior university professor.

His research work has been developed in the field of theoretical and computational chemistry, especially in the development, calibration and application of basis sets for the calculation of transition metal systems and in the theoretical study of the molecular structure and excited electronic states of electroactive systems.

As far as his teaching work is concerned, he has taught various subjects in the degrees of Chemistry, Biology, Chemical Engineering and Environmental Sciences, as well as in the double degree in Physics and Chemistry, and in the university master's degrees of Secondary Education Teacher and Chemistry. He was coordinator of the pilot project of educational innovation for the 1st year of the Bachelor's Degree in Chemistry (2003-2005) and coordinator of European convergence of the Faculty of Chemistry (2005-2009). He has participated in various innovation initiatives and, for one of them (“Theatre is pure chemistry; chemistry is pure theater”), he received in 2010 the award for teaching quality and innovation awarded by the Social Council of the UV.

In the field of management, he was director of the UV Quality Assurance Office (2012-2018), coordinator of the double degree in Physics and Chemistry (2020-2024) and delegate of the rector for teaching transformation (2022-2026). Likewise, he collaborated as an evaluator in various calls and programs for the Agency for the Quality of the University System of Castilla y León (ACSUCYL, 2006-2021), for the Agència Valenciana d'Avaluació i Prospectiva (AVAP, 2017-2020) and for the National Agency for Quality Assessment and Accreditation (ANECA, 2019-2026), where he currently acts as an academic member of the Accreditation Commission EUROLABEL.

Dr. Daniel Tordera is an Associate Professor of Physical Chemistry at the Universitat de València and a researcher at the Institute of Molecular Science (ICMol). He currently serves as Vice-Dean at the Faculty of Chemistry, where he also contributes to the coordination of educational innovation. His profile combines fundamental and applied research in optoelectronic materials, university teaching, knowledge transfer, and academic leadership.

Scientific Career

His research follows a chemistry-driven approach to the design of functional materials, interfaces, and device architectures for robust optoelectronic technologies. Throughout his career, he has connected fundamental physical and chemical mechanisms with device engineering, scalable processing, and real-world applications in light emission, sensing, imaging, and healthcare.

• Ionic materials for light emission (2010–2015): During his PhD at the Universitat de València, he investigated the operating mechanisms of light-emitting electrochemical cells, establishing how ion transport, electrochemical doping, and exciton quenching determine turn-on time, efficiency, brightness, and operational stability. This mechanistic understanding guided the selection of materials and operating conditions for fast, efficient, and stable devices. His doctoral work received the Outstanding Doctorate Award from the Universitat de València and the Nanomatmol Award for the best Spanish PhD in Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials from the Real Sociedad Española de Química. He subsequently co-founded LEC-VAL Lighting S.L. to transfer this technology to the market; the company was selected by the Repsol Entrepreneurship Fund as one of its most innovative business proposals.
• Optical and plasmonic nanomaterials (2015–2017): As a postdoctoral researcher at Linköpings Universitet, he explored how nanoscale optical fields and plasmonic heating can be coupled to material and device functionality, enabling materials platforms for energy and sensing, with examples such as a plasmonic-based display, a ZnO-based large-scale photoconductive paper and a novel thermoplasmonic thermistor concept.
• Large-area organic photodetectors and imaging (2017–2020): As a Senior Researcher at Holst Centre-TNO he led research on near-infrared organic photodetectors for biometric and healthcare applications, covering materials development, device engineering, large-area fabrication, and systems integration. The resulting technologies included a non-contact vein-pattern large-area imager, Fabry–Perot spectrally selective photodetectors, imagers for biomedical readouts (PPG and pulse oximetry) and large-area fingerprint arrays with an FBI-standard resolution. He also led the strategic roadmap, intellectual property portfolio, business development, and industrial collaborations of this research line, working with major high-technology and consumer-electronics companies.
• OLEDs, perovskite LEDs and perovskite photodetectors (2020–present): At the Universitat de València, his research examines how composition, defect chemistry, interfaces and device architecture can be engineered to improve the performance, stability, uniformity, and manufacturability of organic and perovskite devices. Two lines of research drive this effort: (i) light-emitting devices: development of OLED architectures enabled by perovskite transport layers and research on perovskite LED strategies targeting stability and uniformity at the device level; (ii) perovskite photodetectors: studying novel approaches for perovskite visible and biomedical sensing platforms such as semitransparent bifacial NIR perovskite photodetectors, tunable narrowband perovskite–perovskite tandems, and vacuum-deposited perovskite photodiodes for X-ray detection, among others.

Dr. Tordera has authored 78 journal articles and 1 book chapter, with over 3,900 citations and an h-index of 36, and holds two ANECA-recognized six-year research evaluation periods (“sexenios”). His work has been presented at over 60 national and international conferences. His research has generated five international patents in emissive devices, optical filtering, biomedical imaging, and large-area sensing. He has served as principal investigator in three competitively funded research projects and has participated in twelve additional national and European projects. He has co-supervised three doctoral theses completed between 2023 and 2025 and continues to supervise doctoral researchers in perovskite photodetectors and light-emitting devices. He has also supervised five MSc theses, seven bachelor’s theses, visiting doctoral researchers, and students undertaking research and external placements.

His scientific contributions have resulted in multiple awards and honors such as Journal of Materials Chemistry C Emerging Investigator (RSC, 2022), the XVIII Scientific Technical Award Ciutat d’Algemesí (2023), the Society for Information Display Distinguished Paper Award (2019), the Nanomatmol Award for the best PhD in Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials in Spain (RSEQ, 2015) and the E-MRS Spring Meeting Young Scientist Award (E-MRS, 2012), among others. He was also shortlisted twice for the Journal of Materials Chemistry Lectureship Award (RSC, 2023 and 2024). He is a trusted evaluator for major funding bodies (European Research Executive Agency, European Innovation Council, Agencia Estatal de Investigación, Austrian Science Fund, Latvian Council of Science) and a reviewer for the major editorial groups (Wiley, ACS, RSC, Springer Nature). He has been a visiting researcher at the University of California, Santa Barbara, the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, Cornell University, and Columbia University.

Teaching and Educational Innovation

Dr. Tordera has taught more than 1,350 official hours across the degrees in Chemistry, Pharmacy, Human Nutrition and Dietetics, and Criminology, combining lectures, laboratory teaching, computing-based instruction, research projects, and external placements. He has also delivered postgraduate teaching in international research management at ITMO University. His teaching quality has received sustained institutional and student recognition. He obtained the maximum possible score in the Universitat de València DOCENTIA evaluation, with an “Excellent” rating of 200 points, and his student evaluations have consistently remained at a high level across theoretical, laboratory, and computing subjects. He holds one recognised five-year teaching evaluation period.

His educational practice focuses on active learning, question-driven instruction, gamification, scientific debates, interdisciplinary learning, and the responsible integration of digital and artificial-intelligence tools. He has designed and implemented escape-room activities for chemistry teaching, redesigned Physical Chemistry laboratory instruction in Pharmacy, and led a project integrating digital teaching tools. He has published seven contributions on educational innovation and has presented this work at more than twenty national and international conferences. He is actively involved in the interdisciplinary educational innovation initiative Innocampus Explora Burjassot-Paterna and has led two additional educational innovation projects. Through these activities, he contributes to connecting scientific disciplines, promoting active and collaborative learning, and strengthening communication between science and society.

Beyond his own teaching, Dr. Tordera contributes to professional development in higher education. He has delivered university training courses for his peers on educational escape rooms and on the strategic design of teaching and research projects for academic promotion, and he has participated in the organisation of the national INDOQUIM Chemistry Education Meeting.

Academic Leadership and Management

Since September 2025, Dr. Tordera has served as Vice-Dean for Student Recruitment and Employability at the Faculty of Chemistry of the Universitat de València. In this role, he coordinates initiatives related to student recruitment, transition into university studies, employability, links with companies, and the visibility of Chemistry among prospective students. He also organises the Faculty’s Employment Fair and co-coordinates outreach programmes connecting the university with secondary schools. He has also been Coordinator of Educational Innovation at the Faculty of Chemistry since 2022. His responsibilities include promoting and coordinating educational innovation activities, supporting interdisciplinary projects, facilitating the exchange of teaching practices, and representing the Faculty in national and European educational networks. 

Internationally, he is Spain’s elected representative on the IUPAC Committee on Chemistry Education (CCE) for 2026–2027 and one of five Spanish representatives serving across IUPAC divisions during this biennium. He also represents the Faculty of Chemistry in the European Chemistry Thematic Network (ECTN), contributing to the organisation of its Summer School and General Assembly.