Eleni Kanakousaki is a PhD candidate at the Biology Department at the University of Crete and IESL-FORTH. She received her Bachelor degree from the Pharmacy Department at the University of Patras, in 2019. She conducted her Bachelor thesis at the lab of Pharmaceutical Technology and Analysis and studied the effect of temperature on the complexing of Diclofenac with various Cyclodextrins. In 2019, as an intern at the lab of Molecular Pharmacology at the Department of Medicine at the University of Crete, she worked on the determination of the structure and function of the corticotropin releasing factor (CRF) type 1 receptor (CRF1R).

In 2021, she conducted her Master thesis at the Tissue Engineering Regenerative Medicine and Immuno-engineering lab, in collaboration with the “Ultrafast Laser Micro and Nano Processing” Group of IESL, FORTH, entitled “The effect of Cellulose Acetate (CA) micropatterned replicas’ topography, loaded with statins, on osteogenic differentiation of mouse Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs)”. From 2023, she is a member at the “Ultrafast Laser Micro and Nano Processing” Group of IESL, FORTH, as a PhD candidate. Her PhD focuses on Bone Tissue Engineering and involves the interdisciplinary fields of Biology, Material Science, Pharmaceutical Technology and Biomedical Engineering.

Her main research interests focus on bio-fabrication techniques (e.g., soft lithography, 3D-printing), the physicochemical properties and cytocompatibility of polymeric scaffolds, local drug delivery applications and the correlation of bioactive polymer scaffolds with the cellular responses (cell adhesion, proliferation, mechanotransduction and differentiation). Her research aims to develop polymer-based bioactive scaffolds with a substantially lower environmental footprint, for promoting osteogenesis and vascularization, in order to enhance the bone regeneration process.