Eva-Mari Aro is a research director and Professor (Emerita) of Molecular Plant Biology in the Department of Life Technologies, University of Turku, Finland.

Eva-Mari is known for her contributions to international photosynthesis research on plants and cyanobacteria. She has particularly focused on the diversity of regulation mechanisms that protect the photosynthetic light reactions against inherent, but potentially hazardous, generation of reactive oxygen species. Data accumulated from prokaryotic cyanobacteria to eukaryotic algae, mosses, conifers and flowering plants, together with development of SynBio approaches, is providing us with a toolbox to enhance photosynthesis in living 'cell factories' and thereby boost the development of truly sustainable production platforms for chemicals that currently rely on fossil fuels.

Eva-Mari was honored as an Academician of Science in 2017 and Commander First Class of the Order of the Lion of Finland in 2019. She was elected a member of the Finnish Academy of Science and Letters in 2002 and Finnish Technical Sciences Academy in 2012. In 2018 Aro was elected as Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences (NAS).