Personal Information

Fields of Interest and Expertise

Atomic Force Microscopy and Mechanical properties of Biomolecules.

Fabrication of substrates for controlling the cell adhesion and migration.

Curriculum Vitae

1999: Degree in Physics University of Rome “La Sapienza” (final mark 110/110 summa cum laude) Thesis work “Thermodynamics of properties of large biological supramolecular complexes in solution.”

1990: PhD in Physics at the University of Lausanne (Switzerland). Thesis on Study of protein conformational changes by Atomic Force Microscopy.

2004- 2005: Junior post doc in the Institute of Complex Matter Physics in the group of Living Matter Physics working on Study of the scaling properties of DNA knots. 

2005- 2007: Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Bologna working on Single molecule force spectroscopy on proteins involved in Parkinson’s disease. 

2008 until present: Researcher at the CNR (Institute for the Study of Nanostructured Materials) in the field of nanotechnology applied to cell growth and Scanning Probe Microscopy applied to biomolecules and cells.

Awards

2000:  Roche Research Foundation Fellowship.

2006: NanoBio Prize 2006, awarded by the Biomolecular Medicine Consortium,

2008: National Copernic Prize 2008 for physics.

• CNR - ISMN Bologna

• Morphological changes of calcite single crystals induced by graphene–biomolecule adducts. Journal of Crystal Growth (2017)
• Self-protective action in multicomponent fluorescent self-assembled monolayers. RSC Advances (2016)
• A nanoscale interface promoting molecular and functional differentiation of neural cells. Scientific Reports (2016)
• Antimicrobial properties of graphene-like nanoparticles: coating effect on Staphylococcus aureus. Journal of Nanoparticle Research (2016)
• Nanoscale analysis of degradation processes of cellulose fibers. Micron (2016)