Dorina Opris and very thin components for die-cutting: Conductive layers printed with carbon-based ink are later sandwiched between layers of polysiloxane. Image: Empa
Dorina Opris and very thin components for die-cutting: Conductive layers printed with carbon-based ink are later sandwiched between layers of polysiloxane. Image: Empa At Empa, Dorina Opris is researching how to synthesize complex electroactive polymers for robotic components, sensors or batteries - a promising project that the European Research Council (ERC) is currently funding with one of its prestigious ERC Consolidator Grants. This is not the chemist's first success - but the road that led to it wasn't all that easy. At first glance, the career of Dorina Opris, born in 1974, seems like a picture-book one: from studying chemistry at Babes-Bolyai University in Cluj, Romania, to the Free University of Berlin, to becoming a titular professor at ETH Zurich and head of the Functional Polymeric Materials research group at Empa - funded by an ERC Consolidator Grant worth around two million euros. All this with a family and the joys, worries, and duties of two children. How does this work? With talent that was recognized and encouraged early on - even as a student in Transylvania. With a diverse education - not only in theory, but also in laboratory practice, which Opris misses in some of her students in Switzerland.
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