Curriculum

CURRENT POSITION: Assistant Professor, academic discipline BIOS-14/A, Human Anatomy, Department of Translational Medicine, Unife (from 01/10/2023)

QUALIFICATIONS

13/10/2010 - Bachelor's Degree in Biological Sciences, Unife

18/07/2012 - Master's Degree in Biomolecular and Cellular Sciences, Unife

26/02/2016 - PhD in Biochemistry, Molecular Biology and Biotechnology, Unife

TRAINING AND RESEARCH AT QUALIFIED ITALIAN RESEARCH INSTITUTES

-01/05/2016 - 31/03/2017 Research Fellow, Department of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Unife.

- 01/04/2017 - 31/07/2017 Post-Doc Fellow, Department of Biomedical Surgical Specialities, Unife

- 01/08/2017 - 31/07/2018 Research Fellow, Department of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Unife

- 01/08/2018 - 23/11/2018 Post-Doc Fellow, Department of Life Sciences and Biotechnology, Unife

- 01/11/2019 - 31/05/2021 Research Fellow (SSD BIO/16, Human Anatomy), Department of Morphology,

Surgery and Experimental Medicine, LTTA Centre, Unife.

-01/06/2021 - 30/06/2022 Research Fellow (SSD BIO/16, Human Anatomy), Department of Translational Medicine, LTTA Centre, Unife

- 01/07/2022- 30/09/2023 Assistant Professor, Department of Environmental and Prevention Sciences, LTTA Centre, Unife

TRAINING AND RESEARCH AT QUALIFIED FOREIGN RESEARCH INSTITUTES

-        21/02/2015 - 31/08/2015 Visiting Fellow University of Southern California (USC), Los Angeles (USA). The activity carried out under Prof. Roberta Diaz Brinton's supervision was aimed to study cholesterol during the perimenopausal transition.

-        11/04/2016 - 05/08/2016 Visiting fellow IBP, Brno (Czech Republic). The activity carried out under the supervision of Prof. Karel Soucek, was aimed to characterized human fibroblasts obtained from skin biopsies of RETT’s patients, followed by their reprogramming into stem cells (iPSCs).

TEACHING ACTIVITY

Professor of the courses of general and special Human Anatomy in the following Degree Courses, Unife:

-        Sports and exercise sciences

-        Speech and Language Therapy

-        Dentistry and Dental Prosthesis

MANAGEMENT ACTIVITY

-Member of the Faculty of the PhD in “ADVANCED THERAPIES AND EXPERIMENTAL PHARMACOLOGY”, Unife from 2024/25 cycle XL

- Member of the following Scientific Societies:

- From 2022 to date, Ordinary Member of the Italian Society of Histochemistry (SII).

- From 2023 to date, Ordinary Member of the Italian Society of Anatomy and Histology (SIAI)

- From 2023 to date, Ordinary Member Italian Society of Experimental Biology (SIBS)

- From 2023 to present, Ordinary Member European Society for Cancer Research (EARC)

-Guest Editor Special Issue “The Role of Apoptosis in Tissue Homeostasis, Malignancies, and Disease Pathogenesis, Cell (ISSN 2073-4409), MDPI (May 2024- March 2025)

RESEARCH ACTIVITY

Publications: 37 articles in international scientific journals, H index = 17, Citations: 851 (17 January 2025, Scopus).

Main Research Projects:

-PI of the national research project entitled: “Synthesis and nanodelivery of Nutlin-3a for preclinical studies in retinoblastoma models”. Young Researchers Funding year 2023, 5x1000 funds year 2021, University of Ferrara. From 29-06-2023 to 28-06-2024

-PI of the national research project entitled: “Evaluation of mitochondrial functionality in the female brain during menopause and possible involvement in the development of dementia”. Young Researchers Funding year 2015, 5x1000 funds year 2012, University of Ferrara. From 04-02-2015 to 31-07-2015

-COLLABORATOR, FIRD project - Fund for the Incentive to Departmental Research 2023 Unife. “Nanodelivery of Nutlin-3a for preclinical studies in retinoblastoma models”. From 01/02/2023 to 31/01/2025

-COLLABORATOR, FIRD project - Fund for the Incentive to Departmental Research 2024 of Unife. “Study of the effects of antioxidant molecules targeted to the mitochondrion in in vitro models of muscle diseases”. From 30/01/2024 to 15/12/25

-COLLABORATOR, Industrial Research and Experimental Development project (call 2017, years 2019-2020) (MIUR; PNR 2015-2020 n° ARS01_01163): “HelixRECovery Recovery of waste mucosal substance from snail farms.” From 1/11/2019 to 31/08/2020

-COLLABORATOR, POR FESR 2014-2020 project (years 2020-2021) Emilia-Romagna region (CUP E81F18000330007): “Supercomputing Unified Platform-Emilia Romagna (SUPER)”. From 1/09/2020 to 01/06/2021

-COLLABORATOR, POR FESR 2014-2020 project (years 2020-2021) Emilia-Romagna region (CUP E91F18000240007) “CUBIBOX (Customized Biologicl Box): new generation platform for in vitro testing”. From 01/11/2019 to

-COLLABORATOR, POR FESR 2014-2020 project (years 2020-2022) Emilia-Romagna region (CUPF71F18000140009) “BIOPHOTOMICS: development and pilot validation of a portable medical device for biophotonic imaging integrated with lipid-omic testing methodology”. From 01/06/2021 to 30/06/2022

-COLLABORATOR, PNRR project code PNRR-MAD-2022-12376878 (years 2022-2024): “Chronic non-communicable diseases with a high impact on health and social care systems: etiopathogenesis and disease mechanisms.” From 20/05/2023 to 20/05/2025.

-COLLABORATOR, PR-FESR 2021-2027 Emilia-Romagna region project (CUP E87G22000500007) “3D-MAB: Vascularized biomimetic model”. From 01/02/2024 to 31/01/2026

TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER

Operating staff of the Biobank Service of the “Laboratory for Advanced Therapy Technologies” (LTTA), Industrial Research and Technology Transfer Laboratory accredited by the Emilia-Romagna Region (DGR 1213/2007) with approval n.GPG/2012/119 of 6 February 2012. Actively involved in numerous projects conducted in partnership between public and private bodies and regional/national companies.

MAIN RESEARCH TOPICS: The scientific activity is mainly aimed to study survival/apoptosis, proliferation and differentiation events. For these studies, morpho-functional and the study of specific intracellular pathways have been used, combining optical, electron, and fluorescence microscopy techniques, flow cytometry, immunohistochemistry, and in vitro functional assays.

The research activity has focused mainly on the following fields of interest: (I) Study of new molecules of different origin (plant, animal or synthetic) in preclinical models of various types of tumors; (II) study of the inflammatory and oxidative response in response to polluting or sensitising molecules in preclinical in vitro models; (III) study of oxidative damage and the antioxidant response in biological fluids or primary cells derived from skin biopsies of patients with neurodevelopmental or neurodegenerative diseases.