Sahika Inal, KAUST associate professor of Bioscience and principal investigator of the Organic Bioelectronics Laboratory Lab, joined the Computational Bioscience Research Center (CBRC) on July 1, 2021. In CBRC, Sahika will work on designing electronic devices that can efficiently communicate with biological systems.
Prof. Inal joined KAUST In 2016 as an Assistant Professor before being promoted to Associate Professor this year. Prior to joining KAUST, she was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Bioelectronics at the Center of Microelectronics of Provence of the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Mines de Saint-Étienne (France).
Dr. Inal's research is in the area of bioelectronics. Her research interests cover organic electronic materials and devices that can address research and clinical health monitoring and therapy needs. She is particularly interested in ionic-electronic conduction in organic electronic materials and explores the potential of these materials for recording small biological signals and modulating biological events. She aims to design electronic devices that can efficiently interface with the human body. She has been involved in projects on (i) the design of a polymer-based optical sensor for fast diagnostics of pathogens, (ii) a conducting polymer scaffold for 3D cell culture, (iii) integrating lipid bilayers with electrochemical transistors and (iv) the development of an electrophoretic device embedded with sensing components that stops epileptiform activity through localized drug delivery.