Gianluca Farinola is a synthetic organic chemist who sets up new methods to produce photo- and electro- active molecules, supramolecular structures and materials  for applications ranging from organic photonics and electronics to biology.
In the last ten years his research has opened intriguing directions by exploiting photosynthetic microorganisms (e.g. algae and bacteria) and biological polymers (e.g. melanin) as a source of green materials for future optoelectronics and biomedicine. His work has shown how it is possible to use silica microstructures extracted from algae to obtain nanomaterials for photonics, biomedicine and smart nanodevices for environmental recovery. Similarly, bacteria can be incorporated into electronic devices, envisaging a new generation of electronics based on living microorganisms.