Dr. Pilar Aranda is Research Scientist at the Materials Science Institute of the National Research Council of Spain (ICMM-CSIC). She graduated in Chemistry from the Complutense University of Madrid (1986), and then she joined the Materials Science Institute of Madrid, CSIC, carrying out her Ph.D. (1991) under the supervision of Prof. Ruiz-Hitzky on nanocomposite materials based on poly(ethylene oxide)/clay intercalations, which gave rise to a new class of ion conductors. She has worked at the École National Superieur de Chimie de Montpellier, France and at the University of Aberdeen, UK under the supervision of Prof. L. Cot and Prof. A. R. West, respectively. She was subsequently a postdoctoral Fellow at the Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO working with Prof. C.R. Martin before joining the Carlos III University in Madrid as Assistant Professor (1994–1997) till she moved to the ICMM-CSIC. Her research has focused on nanostructured functional organic–inorganic and bio-inorganic hybrid materials, mainly based on silicates and clays, for diverse applications: electrochemical devices, environmental remediation, controlled drug delivery, green bionanocomposites, etc. She has participated in more than 40 research projects funded by public and private funds, has more than 130 publications as articles, book chapters and monographs and has 8 registered patents. She has also participated in the organization of various national and international meetings, acting as General Secretary of the Euchem Conference on Chemical Reactivity in Nanoporous Solids (Miraflores de la Sierra 1999, Spain), Co-chaired the 5th Materials Discussion on Porous Materials and Molecular Intercalation, (The Royal Society of Chemistry, Madrid, 2002), Chaired the Workshop on Hybrid Materials Based on Clay Minerals (Madrid, 2007) and the Workshop on Materials and Clays (Madrid, 2010), and acted as General Secretary of the 2010 Trilateral Meeting on Clays organized by the Spanish Clay Society (SEA), the Clays Science Society of Japan (CSSJ) and the Clay Minerals Society (CMS). She has been General Secretary of the Directive Council of the SEA (2002-2010) and its Liaison Officer at the Asociation International pour l’Étude des Argiles, AIPEA (2004-2010). She is currently Co-Editor-in-Chief of Recent Patents in Nanotechnology and member of the Editorial Board of Clay Minerals and Applied Clays Science journals. Since 2008 she is Head of the “FE-SEM Laboratory” at the ICMM-CSIC.
e-mail: pilar.aranda@csic.es