Histone methylation in stem cell renewal and lineage commitment

Curriculum vitae

Current position:
• Principal investigator
  Director, Laboratory of Stem Cell Epigenetics
  European Institute of Oncology and European School of Molecular Medicine
  Milan, Italy

Previous positions
• 2003-2005:
  • Visiting fellow, Berlin Institute of Advanced Studies, Berlin (Germany)
  • Visiting fellow, Program on Science Technology and Society at the Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University
• 2001-2005: Postdoctoral fellow, Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology, Dresden
• 1997-2001: PhD student, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg

Academic titles

• 1996: M.D., University of Perugia Medical School, with honors (110/110 e lode)
• 1997: Medical Licensing Examination
• 2001: PhD, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Heidelberg (Germany)
• 2007: MA in Health Care Ethics and Law, University of Manchester (with distinction)

Scientific prizes:
• 1995: Prize of the Foundation "Francesco Rebucci" for students and young graduates performing research in experimental oncology
• 1997: National prize "Luigi Casati" from the "Accademia dei Lincei" for the best graduation thesis in Medicine defended during the year 1996
• 1997: Prize "Luigi Manara" from the University of Perugia for the medical student with the best academic curriculum.
• 2003: Roche Prize for the most outstanding contribution at the Roche "Symposium for Leading Bioscientists of the Next Decade" Basel, Switzerland 19-22 March

Organization of conferences and invited lectures
• 2009:
  • Co-organizer of the International Conference ‘Reprogramming Cell fate: Basic Biology and Medical Perspectives’ at the European School of Molecular Medicine, Milan, 11-13 December, with Stefano Casola and Thomas Graf
• 2008:
  • Invited lecturer, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Workshop on Stem Cell Technologies, August 6-13
  • Co-organizer of the European Summer School 'Decosntructing and reconstructing life: from classification to design', with Halldor Stefansson from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory and Sheila Jasanoff from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, Heidelberg, 25-30 August
• 2007: Co-organizer of the conference ‘Times of cloning: historical and cultural aspects of a biotechnological research field’, with Christina Brandt at the Max Planck Institute for the history of Science, Berlin, 1-4 March
• 2005: Invited speaker at the Workshop ‘Ethical aspects of stem cell repositories and databases’, European Commision, Bruxelles, 17 February
• 2004:
  • Co-organizer of the session ‘Socializing Stem Cells’ at the joint conference of the Society for the Social Study of Science and the European Association for the Study of Science and Technology, Paris, 26-28 August
  • Co-organizer of the first European workshop on Science and Narratives ‘Embryos and plots: public lectures on science and narratives’ in collaboration with the Holden School of creative writing and narrative studies directed by Alessandro Baricco, Turin, 22-26 March
• 2003:
  • Invited speaker at the Summer Workshop 2003 on Science and Social Responsibility, The Hastings Center for Bioethics Garrison, NY, 27-30 June
  • Invited speaker at the Fifth International Workshop on Advanced Genomics, Yokohama (Japan), 26-27 June 2003
• 2001: EMBL Forum on Science & Society Symposium "Stem Cell Research and Therapeutic Cloning: Scientific and Social Implications", 16 June
• 2000: First International PhD symposium on Neurobiology "From Genes to Thoughts" EMBL, Heidelberg, 20-21 October

Studies and research
• 2006- present
  Director of the Laboratory of Stem Cell Epigenetics at the European Institute of Oncology, Milan Italy
• 2001-2005
  • Postdoctoral fellow at the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics and the Dresden University of Technology Research theme: epigenetic regulation and genome engineering of embryonic stem cells
  • Visiting fellow, Program on Science Technology and Society at the Kennedy School of Government of Harvard University
  • Visiting fellow, Berlin Institute of Advanced Studies, Berlin (Germany)
  • Winner of the Branco Weiss Fellowship "Society in Science"
  • Roche Prize for the most outstanding contribution at the Roche ‘Symposium for Leading Bioscientists of the Next Decade’ Basel, Switzerland 19-22 March
  • Founder and chairman of the ‘Forum on Science and Society’ of the Max-Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Dresden
• 1997-2001
  
  • PhD programme in molecular and cellular biology at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL Heidelberg) in the laboratory of Dr. A. Francis Stewart. Research theme and PhD thesis title: ‘Modeling leukemia in the mouse: novel strategies in genome engineering’
  • PhD in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory
  • European Doctorate in Biotechnology awarded by the European Association for Higher Education in Biotechnology (HEduBT) for excellence of research in the field of biotechnology
• 1990-1996
  
  • Medical school at the University of Perugia (Italy), including research studentships at the Clinical Research Centre, Harrow (UK) and the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University (New York)
  • Medical Doctor (MD) thesis in Molecular Immunopharmacology at the University of Perugia with Prof. Carlo Riccardi.
  • Graduation from the University of Perugia Medical School with the highest grade and honors (110/110 summa cum laude)
  • National prize "Luigi Casati" from the Accademia dei Lincei for the best graduation thesis in Medicine defended during the year 1996

Research networks and scientific bodies
• Associate Principal Investigator of the European Research Network EuroSyStem, devoted to further new knowledge in stem cell science by using biological and computational expertise.
• Ethics Advisor of the European Research Network ESTools
• Ethics Advisor of the European Research Network NeuroStemCell
• Member of the Ethics and Public Policy Committee of the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR)
• Member of the Ethics Advisory Board of the Human Genetics Foundation in Turin
• Member of the Scientific Board of Observa, an Italian research centre and observatory on the social integration of scientific development
• Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Zukunftskolleg of the University of Konstanz

Languages
• Italian: mother language
• English: Certificate of Proficiency in English of the University of Cambridge with the grade "A"
  Test of English as a foreign language (TOEFL) with a score of 670/670
• German: Zertifikat Deutsch als Fremdesprache (ZDaF) with the grade "gut"
• French

Literary prizes:
• 1986:
  
  • First Prize at the National Contest for Young Writers sponsored by the A.M.M.I. Association of Bologna-Italy.
  • Second Prize at the National Literary Contest "European Roots" sponsored by Fondazione R.U.I.-Rome
• 1987: First Prize in the Poetry Section at the National Literary Contest "Gotto d’Oro dei Castelli Romani".
• 1989: Third Prize in the Section "Young Poetry" at the VI National Literary Contest "Val Formazza ‘89".