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She combines plants and technology for a sustainable future

22 June 2023

Ann-Mari Skude

Eleni Stavrinidou is principal investigator at Electronic plants at Linköping University’s Laboratory of Organic Electronics. Her vision is to develop technologies that will enable new discoveries in plant biology. This can lead to more sustainable food production and to plants that can thrive in the changing climate.

Eleni Stavrinidou
Eleni Stavrinidou is principal investigator at Electronic plants. Photographer: Thor Balkhed

Since she joined the Laboratory of Organic Electronics as a postdoctoral scholar in 2014, Eleni Stavrinidous’ research at Linköping University has resulted in a number of high-profile breakthroughs and publications. It made the news worldwide when, in 2015, she and other researchers showed that electronic circuits can be produced inside the vascular system of a rose. Later, the research group has made further progress.

Eleni Stavrinidou has received several major research grants and awards, including a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship and the L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Prize. Recently she has been awarded the Tage Erlander prize for research in Natural Sciences and Technology. The latter is given to her “for her studies of the interface between electronics and plants and for the development of bioelectronic tools for real-time monitoring and dynamic control of plant physiology". The prize consists of SEK 200,000 in personal prize and SEK 75,000 for organising a symposium or workshop.

“This prize is an important recognition of my work from the scientific community. Furthermore, the publicity that comes with the prize enables my research to reach a broader audience, not only in Sweden but also abroad”, says Eleni Stavrinidou.

In the future she envisions continued research with internationally competitive research groups and more interdisciplinary cooperation between material scientists, engineers, and plant biologists. She would also like to be involved in the commercialization of some of the technologies for application in agriculture or forestry.


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Photo of Eleni Stavrinidou

Eleni Stavrinidou

Senior Associate Professor, Head of Unit

Read more about Eleni Stavrinidou and her research

Eleni Stavrinidou awarded ERC Starting Grant

Incorporating electronic and responsive materials in plant cells in order to produce composites that maintain the living properties of cells and, in the long term, create sustainable systems using nature’s own methods is the focus of her project.
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Storing energy in plants with electronic roots

By watering bean plants (Phaseolus vulgaris) with a solution that contains conjugated oligomers, researchers at the Laboratory of Organic Electronics, have shown that the roots of the plant become electrically conducting and can store energy.
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Researchers at LiU have developed biosensors that make it possible to monitor sugar levels in real time deep in the plant tissues. The information from the sensors may help agriculture to adapt production as the world faces climate change.

Electronic Plants

We develop bioelectronic devices for plant science focusing on more sustainable food production and on plants resistance to environmental stress. We also develop biohybrid technologies and living materials as new sustainable technological concepts.

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