From lab to business: a researcher’s route through the EIC Women Leadership Programme

Bridging academic research and commercial deployment is a familiar and difficult transition for many scientists. For Mery Hernández, a doctoral researcher at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and an EIC Pathfinder awardee, that transition began with the EIC Women Leadership Programme. Hernández used the programme to sharpen leadership and pitching skills, test early business thinking and find a community of peers and mentors while continuing to develop a microwave plasma reactor designed to make hydrogen peroxide on demand.

What she built in the lab

At KIT Hernández is part of the GreenSWaP project funded under EIC Pathfinder. The project explores a green propellant concept for spacecraft and the laboratory work she led focused on producing hydrogen peroxide from water and electricity using a microwave plasma reactor. Hernández says she designed and built what the team describe as the first reactor of its kind capable of continuous, on-demand H2O2 synthesis from only water and electricity.

The team has presented a visual overview of the microwave plasma synthesis pathway and is preparing more extensive results. Their working paper and preprint describe a reactor architecture and initial performance metrics. Those results are preliminary and the authors and external reviewers caution that further development and independent validation are needed before drawing conclusions about commercial readiness.

Why this matters and what is still uncertain

The laboratory result points to two connected potential advantages. First, producing disinfectant and other chemicals close to the point of use can reduce transport, storage and handling of concentrated hazardous liquids. That can have tangible safety and carbon footprint benefits for some applications. Second, in the long term the concept opens speculative scenarios for in situ resource production in space. Both claims require cautious qualification. Decentralised small‑scale production competes with large, low‑cost chemical plants. The specific economics depend on energy cost, reactor yield, reliability and regulatory constraints. For space missions, the gap between a laboratory reactor and an integrated, flight‑qualified system remains very large.

From researcher to entrepreneur: what the EIC Women Leadership Programme offered

Hernández credits a mix of coaching, mentoring and cohort learning for helping her shift from pure research thinking to entrepreneurial steps. Her PhD supervisor encouraged her to apply because he believed the programme would strengthen leadership capabilities. Hernández joined with an explicit goal of learning entrepreneurship from the researcher perspective and to practise defending ideas publicly.

Hernández found the cohort community important beyond the formal training. Conversations with women who had recently completed PhDs and then chosen different paths, either founding start-ups or staying in academia while partnering with industry, gave her concrete examples of alternative career trajectories and resilience strategies.

Actions taken after the programme

Armed with the programme skills Hernández participated in pitching events and applied for early funding while remaining enrolled in her PhD. She reports starting to assemble a pitch deck, testing her speaking skills in public settings and using decision‑making techniques from the programme to prioritise next steps. She also continues to iterate on the reactor and to explore near term commercial applications such as on‑demand disinfection, water treatment and agricultural uses where lower concentrations of oxidants may still be commercially useful.

The EIC Women Leadership Programme in context

The EIC describes the programme as part of its Business Acceleration Services. Launched as a pilot in 2021 the initiative has since run multiple cohorts. The EIC reports that by the time of Hernández’s participation nine cohorts had taken place and more than 300 women had been involved. The 7th cohort is reported to have run from February to April 2025 and focused on researchers and early stage entrepreneurs validating and growing business ideas. Participants receive tailored training on leadership, team management and early financing and are matched with a mentor and a business coach.

A measured assessment and what to watch next

Hernández’s story is useful illustration of how targeted, cohort‑based leadership programmes can accelerate the personal transition from academic researcher to entrepreneur. The coaching and mentor match appear to have helped convert soft skills into concrete actions. The technical work is interesting and worthy of further support but remains at a low maturity level. Key technical questions that determine commercial and space feasibility include achievable product concentration, energy efficiency, reactor lifetime and how to scale or concentrate the peroxide safely.

For potential funders, partners and customers the immediate next steps to watch are peer reviewed publications and independent validation of reactor yields and efficiencies, demonstrations under realistic operational conditions including thermal management and quenching strategies, and pilots that address regulatory, safety and economic calculations for target end markets. If the team can show reliable, energy efficient production at competitive total cost of ownership then decentralised applications such as on‑site disinfection or water treatment may follow first. Space deployment will require a long additional development path.

How to follow or make enquiries

Mery Hernández is based at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and is associated with the EIC Pathfinder project GreenSWaP. For programme related queries the EIC Community suggests using the contact page and selecting the 'EIC Women Leadership Programme' category. The EIC Business Acceleration Services newsletter and community platform are the channels used to announce future cohorts and related activities.

This article draws on an interview with Mery Hernández and on public EIC programme descriptions. Technical preprints from the reactor team provide provisional experimental numbers but have not completed peer review. Readers interested in technical details or programme participation should consult the original sources and follow up with the teams involved.