Current position: Researcher RTD A, Department of Biology, University of Padova Education: 2001 Laurea in Biological Sciences, University of Padova 2006 diploma in Clinical Pathology (scuola specializzazione), University of Padova Professional experience: 2001-04 Fellowship, Department of Biology, University of Padova 2005-09 Research fellowship, Department of Biology, University of Padova 2009-11 Fellowship, Department of Biology, University of Padova 2011-13 Research fellowship, Department of Biology, University of Padova Teaching: “Cell Biology” and “Techniques in mammalian culture cells” for the undergraduate students of Biotechnology master degree. International research experience: 2005 - visiting scientist in the laboratory of Prof. Lars Thelander at the Department of Medical Biochemistry and Biophysics, Umea University, Sweden. 2014 - visiting scietist in the laboratory of Prof. Bruce Stillman at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, New York, U.S.A. with short-term EMBO fellowship. Research activities: My specific interests have concerned the metabolic pathways regulating the intracellular concentration of DNA precursors (dNTPs). In particular I focused on mitochondrial dNTP (mt dNTP) pools. I developed a new method to purify mt dNTPs from mammalian cells and I investigated on mitochondrial diseases due to impaired dNTP metabolism. I set up a cellular model and studied the human mitochondrial syndrome MNGIE (Mitochodrial NeuroGastroIntestinal Encephalomyopathy) due to thymidine phosphorylase deficiency. I investigated the role of the novel ribonucleotide reductase subunit p53R2 related to mtDNA maintenance and nuclear DNA repair. I studied the physiological function of SAMHD1 as the major catabolic enzyme degrading the dNTPs related to the cell cycle progression. At the moment I am interested in endothelial cell metabolism and in particular in the glutaminolysis pathway which is largely unexplored in vascular system. Taking advantage of my previous knowledge I started a new line of research to study the role of the glutaminases GLS1 and GLS2 related to cell proliferation and redox homeostasis using actively growing HUVECs as a model of endothelial cells during angiogenesis in normal and pathological conditions.

Vascular metabolism in health and disease.