Rate My Professor Elena Juan Pardo

Associate Professor Elena Juan Pardo serves as the Laboratory Head of the Translational 3D Printing Laboratory for Advanced Tissue Engineering (T3mPLATE) at the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research. She is an Associate Professor in the School of Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering at The University of Western Australia, and holds an Adjunct Clinical Senior Lecturer position at Curtin University since July 2023. With over 15 years of experience, she has worked across three continents, bridging engineering, biology, and medicine. Her career began as a materials engineer on fusion reactors before shifting to biomedical fields, including roles at the Max-Planck-Institute for Plasma Physics, University of California Berkeley as a postdoctoral fellow, leading the Tissue Engineering and Biomaterials Group in Gipuzkoa, Spain (2008-2012), directing the Master in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Navarra, and serving as Deputy Director of the Centre in Regenerative Medicine at Queensland University of Technology (2013 onwards).

Elena Juan Pardo earned her PhD in Mechanical Engineering from the Technical University of Munich in 2004, MS in Materials Engineering and BS in Industrial Engineering from the University of Navarra in 2001 and 1998. Her research focuses on developing biomaterials and 3D printing technologies, particularly melt electrowriting (MEW), for tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, and 3D in vitro disease models. An internationally recognized expert in MEW, she designs personalized scaffolds for heart valves, vascular grafts, and cardiovascular devices that mimic native tissue properties to stimulate regeneration. Key publications include "3D printing of heart valves" (Trends in Biotechnology, 2024), "Biologically-Inspired Melt Electrowriting for the Generation of Highly Biomimetic Functional Myocardium" (Advanced Functional Materials, 2025), "Programmable Compliance in Small-Diameter Vascular Grafts by Design of Melt-Electrowritten Scaffold Architectures for In Situ Tissue Engineering" (Advanced Healthcare Materials, 2026), and "CT-derived computational modelling in the lifetime management of aortic stenosis" (Journal of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography, 2026). She has received the School of Engineering Award for Research Impact and Innovation (2023), Vice-Chancellor's Award in Research Impact and Innovation (2023), Spanish National Prize in Materials Engineering, Otto-Hahn-Medal of the Max-Planck Society, and Stem Cells Young Investigator Award. As co-founder and director of CoraMetix Pty Ltd since 2023, she advances clinical translation of these technologies.