This week, BCMaterials sealed a new collaboration agreement in the field of research with the HUN-REN Centre for Energy Research in Hungary.

This agreement aims to promote the exchange of knowledge, scientists, and research between both institutions, including joint participation in research projects and the organization of scientific meetings.

We are happy to welcome Richard Schönlein as a new post-doctoral researcher at our center. Richard joins the Active and Smart Materials research line, where he will contribute to the design and fabrication of sustainable, biobased and bioresorbable piezoelectric devices for biomedical applications including energy harvesters, sensors and electroactive scaffolds.

We would like to congratulate Kaiyuan Chen on achieving his PhD in Materials Science and Technology after defending his doctoral thesis today titled "Ultra-wide temperature dielectric stability and polar nanoregions dynamics in 0.6Bi(Mg_0.5Ti_0.5)O₃-0.4Ba_0.8Ca_0.2TiO₃-based ceramics”.

We are delighted with the successful culmination of the work carried out by Dr. Chen during these years at BCMaterials. Congratulations!

Four new predoctoral researchers joined BCMaterials in the first weeks of January: Omaira Arias, Diana Sotelo, Jon Allende and Gabriel Fonseca.

Omaira Arias obtained her Degree in Chemistry from the UPV/EHU in 2022. She then completed the Master's Degree in New Materials at the aforementioned academic institution and will work at our centre in the field of neutron science.

We are happy to announce a new doctor from BCMaterials. Rubén Teijido made a great PhD thesis defense today. Dr. Teijido presented his work titled "Sustainable Anti-Corrosion Coatings Based on Biomaterials for Marine Applications".

We want to warmly congratulate Rubén for his fantastic work during his pre-doctoral stage. We are sure this paves the way for a successful research career. Congratulations!

BCMaterials has dedicated its 2025 desk calendar to collecting a selection of the more than 60 research projects currently underway in which the center participates or leads. Research projects are the backbone of our center's activity, so we wanted to give them an important role through their presence in our calendar, which is shared among the BCMaterials research community, institutions and partners.

On November 27, the Minister for Science, Universities and Innovation of the Basque Government, Juan Ignacio Pérez Iglesias, visited the facilities of BCMaterials in Leioa. The goal of the visit was to show the Minister the important evolution of the centre in the research of new materials since its creation in 2012 until today, when it has more than one hundred people in its own staff, plus another 26 associated researchers freom UPV/EHU.

We want to congratulate Natalia Río López, pre-doctoral researcher of BCMaterials, for becoming new doctor on 17th December. Natalia made a brilliant defense of her thesis entitled "Relation between microstructure and properties in magnetic shape memory alloys studied by neutron diffraction".

It is our pleasure to see Natalia grating this great achievement and we want to underline the hard work she has been doing through these PhD years. Congratulations, Natalia!!

We are happy to welcome Ricardo Brito Pereira as a new Juan de la Cierva post-doctoral fellow researcher at our center. Ricardo joins the Micro and Nano-devices research line, where he will contribute to the design and fabrication of printed smart sensors for environmental and biomedical applications.

BCMaterials welcomes Nerea Lopategui, who joined us as a new Technical Research Assistant intern. She will work providing support to a growing laboratory activity in our facilities. Nerea's academic and professional training is related to clinical and biomedical laboratories. Welcome to the team, Nerea!