Athanasia Orfanou is a PhD Candidate in the Department of the Environment at the University of the Aegean. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Physics from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Greece) and an MSc in Global Environmental Change, Management & Technology at the University of the Aegean. Her research focuses on improving air quality by increasing the quality of citizen science data for decision-making through projects like COMPAIR (https://www.wecompair.eu/ - funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020), which equips citizens with user-friendly sensors and data dashboards. Additionally, she has participated in projects related to the circular economy, such as the Center for Sustainable and Circular Bioeconomy and Energy - Aegean_BIOECONOMY, (https://bit.ly/3c4AxnZ, funded by the Operational Programme "Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship and Innovation" - NSRF 2014-2020), as well as projects on innovative approaches in research, teaching, and institutional advancement such as "European Reform University Alliance" (ERUA) (https://erua-eui.eu/ - co-funded by the erasmus+ programme of the european union).