University of Pisa

The Università di Pisa, founded in 1343, is among the oldest and most prestigious universities in Europe, with alumni such as Galilei, Volterra and Fermi.

The Research Center “E. Piaggio” is located in the School of Engineering and is one of the oldest interdisciplinary research and technology transfer centres in Europe, devoted to the training of personnel for careers in Research and Development. Its main focus is Robotics and Bioengineering, with four pivotal themes; MIND, MATTER, MOTION and MANIPULATION, all dedicated to improving the quality of life and the performance of machines using biological systems for inspiration. Since its foundation in September 1965, the Center has paved the way for the convergence of minds by bringing together scientists from different fields of knowledge, ranging from engineering to mathematics, medicine and psychology. Thirty-two researchers from nine different departments participate in the Center’s activities in a dynamic and open atmosphere, rich with ideas, fostering interdisciplinary exchange. It provides state-of-the-art research and training facilities for young scientists from all over the world, offering researchers from different backgrounds the opportunity to combine their expertise and know-how to generate high-quality, innovative and translational advances in technological, scientific and humanistic fields. The Center has promoted spin-off projects, and it has opened laboratories and activated conventions with hubs of industrial technology in the region of Tuscany. Cooperating with private and public institutions to study specific applied problems that need advanced or innovative solutions, it provides a means to bridge the gap between academic and industrial research. The Center has skilled technical staff and a project management team with over 10 years’ experience in management of small and large scale national and international projects.

Chiara Magliaro

Chiara got her PhD with honors in 2016. For the high quality of her work, she also got the certification for the European Doctorate (Doctor Europaeus).

She won for two years the Fondazione Umberto Veronesi Post-Doctoral Fellowship, in 2018 and 2019. Actually, she is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Information Engineering and an affiliate researcher at the Research Center "E. Piaggio".

Main research focuses:

1. Development of open-source imaging methods for tissue processing, single neuron segmentation and 3D morphometric extraction from confocal/two-photon datasets representing densely-packed neurons in their native arrangement within the brain. The quantitative morphological analysis of the micro-structure could be useful to better understand the structure-function relationship within the brain. In particular, the algorithms she developed was used to study sexual dimorphism in murine models of autism and to unravel human claustral micro-architecture. Recently, she is adapting the algorithms she developed for single-cell 3D reconstruction and 3D morphometric extraction, to map human brain organoids micro-structure.

2. Oxygen and metabolism measurements in vitro and allometric scaling. The real-time monitoring of cellular behaviour in in vitro constructs at different complexity (from traditional monolayers, up to organoids) is crucial for defining quantitative metrics for determining the physiological relevance of engineered constructs.

Arti Ahluwalia

Arti Ahluwalia was born in Kenya and educated in the UK. She has a B.Sc. Physics from Univerisity of Bath, M.Sc. in Instrumentation and Analytical Science from the University of Manchester (formerly UMIST), UK and a Ph.D. in Bioengineering from the Polytechnic of Milan, Italy. Her research interests are in in-vitro models of integrative pathophysiology and associated innovative materials and advanced cell culture systems. She is also involved in capacity building in the field of Biomedical Engineering, in association with UNECA, FABLAB Pisa and ABEC (the African Biomedical Engineering Consortium).

She is Full Professor of Bioengineering and Director of the Interuniversity Center for the Promotion of the 3Rs Principles in Teaching and Research (Centro 3R). Although highly multidisciplinary in nature, her research has centered on the interaction between biological systems and man-made devices or structures focused on the creation of human- based organ and system models in-vitro and in-silico models using soft and smart materials, cells and tissue derivatives, cell imaging, computational methods and intelligent bioreactor design as a way towards understanding tissue cross talk and how this cross talk is used to orchestrate systemic physiology. The applications span from disease models to alternatives to animal testing.

Current projects are on tissue regeneration, biosensing, bioreactors, in-vitro metabolism (SINERGIA), biomimetic systems for the replacement of animal tests and nanotoxicology (Patrols), advanced imaging (DataBrain, SENSEI) and open biomedical engineering in education (UBORA, ABEM).

Nicola Vanello

Nicola Vanello, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell’Informazione and the Research Center “E. Piaggio” at the University of Pisa. He received his Degree in Electronic Engineering, with a curriculum in Biomedical Engineering, in 2001 from the University of Pisa, Italy. He received his PhD in Automatics, Robotics and Bioengineering from the Department of Electrical Systems and Automation of University of Pisa, on 2006.

His research activity is related to models and methods for biomedical signal and image processing. In particular, his skills concern the study of cerebral functions in complex cognitive tasks, and the development of exploratory and confirmatory models for data analysis, using electroencephalography. His research interests include the analysis of datasets representing neuronal cells. He is actually coordinating SENSEI, a Partnering Project of the Human Brain Project.

Piera Mancini

Piera Mancini is a PhD candidate in Information Engineering at the University of Pisa, where she also earned her Bachelor and Master degree in Biomedical Engineering.

Her scientific research is currently focused on the developmental of biomimetic multiscale (i.e., micro- and macroscale) in silico models for empowering their potential in 3Rs perspectives. The microscale model, namely ‘Nebuloid’, taking into account structural and functional activities at the cell-level. While ‘Evolvoid’, the macroscale one, based on genetic algorithm, find the optimum morphology of a cell-laden construct in respect to predefined biophysical constraints.

During her period abroad at the Buchmann Institute of Molecular Life Sciences of Goethe university in Frankfurt am Main, she developed an experimental pipeline to validate Evolvoid and improved her microscopy skills.

Sonia Cerchio

Almost one year ago she got my Master Degree in Medical Biotechnologies at University of Bologna, with a thesis on Cellular Biology, but during my studies she also approached the fields of Nanosciences and Biomedical Engineering. An experience abroad helped her to see Scientific research from a different point of view, and to appreciate interdisciplinarity and sharing of knowledge. With a strong motivation, she recently started her pHD studies in Neurosciences, and she will focus my research activity on advanced cellular models of the human brain, focusing sleep and wake states in vitro.

Federico Tozzi

Federico Tozzi is a PhD student in Information Engineering at the University of Pisa, where he earned his Bachelor and Master’s Degreen in Biomedical Engineering. Both of his theses were focused on imaging and image processing. A short period abroad has improved his practical skills with microscopy and image acquisition. Before starting his PhD, he had studied image processing algorithms used to segment neurons from images of high-density networks thanks to a scholarship.

His current research is focused on the development of new methods to characterize the microstructure and metabolism of human brain organoids subject to physiological and altered sleep-wake rhythms.

Flavio Fontana

Flavio Fontana is PhD student in Information Engineering at the University of Pisa, with a background in Biomedical Engineering. After the Master Degree, thanks to a scholaship, he studied how some geometrical and biophysical laws influence cellular aggregate's morphologies in vitro.

He studies cellular variability and biological noise with particular emphasis on the fluctuation due to environmental perturbation (extrinsic noise) and genetic stochasticity (intrinsic noise).

Vanessa Vasquez

Vanessa Vasquez is the Project Manager forthe NAP research project. After her degree in European languages and cultures, she specialised as literature translator at Pisa university. Having a a long experience in the public sector, she is now excited to provide admistrative support to this project as she strongly believes in the value of scientific research.

She also firmly believes that people who share their knowledge and experience can more easily reach their goals.

Ad maiora semper!

Patrizia Granella

Patrizia Granella received the master degree in Sociology from the University of Pisa and the PhD in Politics, Human Rights and Sustainability from the Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna of Pisa.

Since 2014 she started working in the Management Office of the Research Center “E. Piaggio”. She is currently a project manager for international and national research projects in Robotics and Bioingeenering areas.

She is also involved in the preparation of projects proposals and takes care of administrative and financial aspects related to research funds.

In the last years she also gained experience as Editorial Assistant of important Robotics Journals such as Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L) and the International Journal of Robotics Research (IJRR).

Page updated

Google Sites

Report abuse