In 2000, I graduated in Biological Sciences and in 2004 I got my PhD in Molecular Biotechnology, both at University of Pisa, Italy. In 2006, I moved to the US, where I became a post-doctoral fellow in the laboratory of Prof. Pier Paolo Pandolfi, first at MSKCC in New York and then at BIDMC-HMS in Boston. In 2009, I started a second post-doc in the lab of Prof. Iman Osman at NYU. In 2012, I was appointed as Principal Investigator of the Oncogenomics Unit of ITT (now ISPRO) and in 2016 I became Staff Scientist at the Institute of Clinical Physiology of the National Research Council in Pisa, Italy, where my lab is located.
Throughout my scientific career, my research interests have mostly revolved around non-coding RNAs (microRNAs, pseudogenes, ceRNAs) in cancer. Currently, the activities of my lab are focused on the study of the coding and non-coding regulatory networks that revolve around BRAFV600E isoforms in melanoma. To this end, we use a wide range of techniques, both in vitro (yeast, melanoma cell lines) and in vivo (melanoma modeling in zebrafish and in the mouse). We are also developing strategies for the selective delivery of drug combinations inside cancer cells.
